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<br />Item No: 7H <br />Meeting Date: May 14, 2007 <br />Type of Business: CB <br />Administrator Review: ____ <br />City of Mounds View Staff Report <br />To: Honorable Mayor and City Council <br />From: James Ericson, Community Development Director <br />Item Title/Subject: First Reading and Introduction of Ordinance 789, an <br />Ordinance Amending Section 697.08 (Noise Control <br />Regulations) of the Municipal Code Relating to <br />Construction Noise <br /> <br /> <br />Introduction: <br /> <br />As part of our ongoing effort to ensure the City’s Municipal Code is up to date and <br />consistent with City goals, policies and procedures, staff reviewed the City’s noise control <br />regulations (Section 607.08) and, in consultation with the City Attorney, is suggesting <br />amendments to clarify and improve the effectiveness of the subdivision requirements and <br />eliminate inconsistent language. <br /> <br />Discussion: <br /> <br />The City’s noise control regulations prohibit loud, unnecessary or unusual noises which <br />either annoys, disturbs or affects the comfort, repose, health or peace of others, regardless <br />of time. Granted, enforcement of this provision can be difficult because what one person <br />considers a loud an unnecessary noise, another may not. The Code further indicates that <br />loud or disturbing noises shall be prohibited from 10:00 pm through 7:00 pm. The Code <br />then addresses the specific issue of construction noise, requiring that no construction <br />noise be generated between the hours of 10:00 pm and 6:00 am and at any time on a <br />Sunday. (Refer to Exhibit 1 for the full text of the noise regulations.) <br /> <br />Many residents have complained about the early construction start time (6:00 am) <br />remarking that 6:00 am is too early for such disruptions. The regulations inexplicably <br />indicate that an individual or family working on their own home shall be exempted from <br />the noise control regulations. Such an exemption seems arbitrary, because—in theory— <br />the same amount of noise would be generated by the home building or remodeling <br />activity regardless of who’s doing it. The intent of this exemption, we suspect, is that the <br />Council in place at the time the regulation was codified did not want to place undue <br />restrictions on homeowners working on their own homes, thus making a distinction <br />between resident builders and non-resident builders. <br /> <br />In the attached Ordinance 789, staff is suggesting that the start time for construction be <br />changed to 7:00 am and that the exemption for resident builders be eliminated.