Evanston’s Human Services Committee discussed measures to regulate beekeeping in the city Monday night while also considering a retroactive moratorium that would force a teenage boy to remove a beehive from his back yard.
Gabriel Jacobs, 14, filled a hive with 15,000 to 20,000 honeybees without the knowledge of neighbors or the committee, which had agreed to continue discussions about beekeeping after a May 1 meeting.
On Monday night, the committee asked Gabriel’s mother, Susan Dickman, to remove the hive.
“This, to me, is a reflection of someone taking advantage of the situation by disregarding the concerns of neighbors and doing their own thing,” said Ald. Lionel Jean-Baptiste, the committee chairman. “There were no bees in that back yard before we started deliberations.”
Dickman said she had not decided if the hive will be removed before regulations are in place.
The committee voted 3-2 not to institute a blanket ban on beekeeping in the city. The City Council will take up the issue June 26.
Proposed beekeeping regulations could include high fences around hives, permits and insurance requirements. Beekeepers also might be required to get their neighbors’ permission to keep hives.
“The big thing is that people have to be respectful of their neighbors,” said Ald. Steven Bernstein, who made many of the recommendations, before the meeting.
Gabriel Jacobs ignited the controversy when he decided to take up beekeeping as a hobby. Neighbors complained to the city, which began looking into the matter. But in the meantime, the teen filled his hive with honeybees he had bought for $67 from a California-based firm.
He’s not sure what all the fuss is about.
“It’s just a hobby,” he said.
Currently, beekeeping doesn’t break any of Evanston’s ordinances, and at least one resident has been raising bees for years.
But the endeavor has upset several neighbors who oppose having thousands of bees flying around the neighborhood in pursuit of the pollen they use to make honey.
“These lot sizes are just not appropriate for the hobby,” said John Black, a neighbor who said his mother is allergic to bees.
“I’m not anti-beekeeping. [But] it’s a property ownership issue,” Black said. “If [Jacobs] could keep them in his back yard and out of mine, I wouldn’t be talking to anybody about this.”
Since the controversy was publicized last month, the city has received hundreds of e-mails from people across the country, both praising and blasting beekeeping in residential neighborhoods.
