To take arms against a sea of phone books

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

Aldermen Gewirtz and Desmond, and simultaneously Aldermen White and Sullivan, have introduced measures to stem the flow of unwanted phone books (text below the cut). If you have an opinion about unwanted phone books, the My Somerville page is a good way to find out who your aldermen are and let them know.

Order

By Ald. Gewirtz and Desmond, That City Solicitor draft an ordinance to curtail mass phone book distribution in the interest of the environment and the convenience of residents, and provide an advisory opinion about how to do this so that phone books are available upon request but are not littered on doorsteps of those who do not want them.

Order

By Ald. White and Sullivan, That a representative of the City Solicitor appear before this Board’s Committee on Legislative Matters to address regulating the non-mail distribution of advertising brochures and phone books.

Comments

for more about this, read the earlier thread

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

Phone books = do not want (http://community.livejournal.com/davis_square/1605320.html)

These orders are from yesterday's (Jan 22nd) Board of Aldermen meeting agenda (http://www.somervillema.gov/CoS_Content/documents/agenda/01-22-2009.pdf) (pdf).

I find the Gewirtz/Desmond order confusing. First, aren't the aldermen the legislators, so why would they ask the solicitor to draft legislation? Second, "to curtail mass phone book distribution" is completely vague. The White/Sullivan order is easier to understand. Unfortunately, neither order specifies a time-frame for action.

It would make a ton of sense for phonebooks to be optional.

I wonder how the aldermen came up with these ideas simultaneously and why in two pairs? Is this some coordinated strategy or just coincidence?

Re: for more about this, read the earlier thread

[ron_newman]

Doesn't the City Solicitor normally draft any legislation requested by the aldermen, to make sure it is in proper form?

Re: for more about this, read the earlier thread

[cos]

Alderman ask the city's lawyer to come up with the actual language, based on their description of what they want it to do, and then they vote on it. As the lawyer, he's best qualified to write something that fits in with existing city ordinances, and that does what it is meant to do. Also, I'm sure that they can actually discuss the details in person, and the point of the formal order isn't to exactly specify everything about the ordinance, but rather to summarize what it's about.

[sunshineyellow.livejournal.com]

Phone books are still very useful. Has anyone even thought of how to make this case to the many many business owners who still find business through the phone book?

[vonelftinhaus.livejournal.com]

Nope-Internets is the business finder

Re: for more about this, read the earlier thread

[barry-rafkind.livejournal.com]

That makes sense, Cos, thanks.

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

Phone books are useful to some people, but not everyone. The phone books I got a few weeks ago are still sitting on my porch, and may well stay there until a new crop replaces them next year; no one is getting my business via those phone books, so they wouldn't lose if it I didn't have the phone book. By all means make them available to the people who want them, but mine is just trash.

[billharnois.livejournal.com]

I was thinking we should all get together and bring our unwanted phone books and collectively dump them on some Verizon property. We'd have to damage them a bit at first, so they can't redistribute. Who's with me?

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

I think a lot of them ended up in woodstoves!

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

My phone books never even make it upstairs. They go directly from porch to recycling bin.

[thetathx1138.livejournal.com]

Sure, for some people but not for others, and they throw too many of them on the doorstep. At my place, we've got two apartments, two phonebooks makes sense.

Instead they left SEVEN.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately mine arrive on the front porch but the recycle bin is at the back. Curses.

[ron_newman]

Verizon has a facility on Central Street, between Winter Hill and Spring Hill, just south of the bridge over the railroad tracks.

Map and Street View

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

What a great idea!

[somertricky.livejournal.com]

And the only reason I'm singing you this song now
is cause you may know somebody in a similar situation,
or you may be in a similar situation, and if your in a
situation like that there's only one thing you can do
and that's walk into the shrink wherever you are,
just walk in say "Shrink, You can get anything you want,
at Alice's restaurant.". And walk out.

You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he's really sick and they won't take him.

And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're both (impolite term for homosexuals) and they won't take either of them.

And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and walking out. They may think it's an organization.

And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day,I said
fifty people a day walking in singin a bar of Alice's Restaurant and
walking out. And friends they may thinks it's a movement.

Can't carry around a phone book

[highland-a.livejournal.com]

I agree. I can't remember the last time I used a phone book. Part of this is because I also haven't had a land line in years. How relevant is a phone book when your phone is portable? Our piles of phone books go straight from our entryway to our recycling bin as well.

[sunshineyellow.livejournal.com]

Most people do not use Yelp to find a mechanic, I'm just saying.

[sunshineyellow.livejournal.com]

Phone books are provided as a public service. I don't know why your mild inconvenience trumps the inconvenience someone else would have to go through to obtain one.

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

It doesn't, but I don't see how other people are inconvenienced by my not getting a phone book.

[clevernonsense.livejournal.com]

The millions of trees that go into producing phone books every year is more than a mild inconvenience to me. Recycling helps, yes, but that's still a huge waste of energy and resources.

My home town never had phone books delivered (and this was pre-internet when they were quite important still) -- we just had a pile of them at the post office. I don't see how that's inconvenient for anyone who wants one.