A move to require notice and consent from neighbors for residents looking to put up a beehive adjacent to their properties didn’t fly with members of an Evanston City Council committee on Monday.
Members of the city’s Human Services Committee balked at the staff recommendation, which came in the wake of concerns voiced by a longtime Evanston resident, Nancy Schwartz, to the committee last September that her health was threatened when a neighbor installed a beehive next door in their urban neighborhood without her knowledge.
In committee discussion Monday, Ald. Brian Miller, 9th, acknowledged the concerns raised by the special case, but opposed giving a resident an outright veto in such matters.
Rather, he argued such cases should go to the committee or City Council members for them to decide in the form of an appeal, such as on a zoning case.
“I think the process proposed (by staff) isn’t conducive to keeping beekeeping in Evanston,” he said.
The issue came to the committee last year in the form of a dispute between neighbors.
Schwartz, a homeowner in the 1100 block of Hull Terrace, a residential street located a few blocks west of Presence Saint Francis Hospital, said she was caught unaware when her neighbor Willis Silverthorne installed a bee hive in June of 2015, a short distance from her back yard.
Schwartz told the committee that she suffers from lupus, an autoimmune disease and that she is highly allergic to bee stings. A sting could place her at the risk of going into anaphylactic shock, she said.
Silverthorne, an analyst for a commodities trading firm at the time, said he got into beekeeping to bring more pollinators to the area. He told the committee Monday night that he has tried several changes in response to Schwartz’s concerns but believes they are based on fear of bees and so far has not been successful.
“There’s no real nuisance here, there are no bees really in their yard and I’m constantly trying to prove it to them,” he told committee members.
Nonetheless, he said he closed his bee colony three months ago and plans to move it 50 miles away to Wisconsin until the situation is resolved. He warned about the effects of such an ordinance, though.
“There are very few bee colonies in Evanston, and if we move forward with a restriction for people to start a beehive, I’m pretty certain that like other townships that do the same, we will not have a beekeeping presence at all,” he said.
Both Nancy Schwartz and her husband Mickey maintained that the issue is not about beehives and pollinators, which they support.
“It is strictly a medical concern with my lupus, the reaction to the bee stings,” Nancy Schwartz told the committee. “This is not fear. This is because it’s a life threatening situation for me.”
Mickey Schwartz said that the proposed requirements would apply not just to his wife but to anyone else in Evanston who might not be aware their is a hive nearby and could be affected.
He suggested that the city could look into setting aside areas for beekeeping, such as the community garden area in James Park, for beekeepers to keep bees in situations “without endangering the neighbor next door to them.”
City staff said in a memo that the proposal to include a requirement for notice and consent from adjacent neighbors was one that that would allow “beekeeping enthusiasts to pursue their hobby on their property while ensuring that neighbors were protected from stings and honeybee nuisances.”
Nearby Skokie’s beekeeping regulations, passed in 2013, requires consent from all neighbors that abut a property with a proposed apiary.
Evonda Thomas-Smith, Evanston’s director of health and human services, pointed out in her memo to the Human Services Committee, that “there is a wealth of information available to the general public regarding honeybee defensive behavior (stinging), and the possibility of significant allergic reactions, especially for beekeepers and those in vicinity of a hive.
“Honeybees are often referred to as less aggressive but that does not predict that they are considered docile pets,” she said. “The venom of the honeybee is injected at the time of stinging, and could cause significant local reactions of a severe, potentially life threatening, allergic reaction minutes after a stinging incident.”
Ald. Melissa Wynne, 3rd, though not a member of the committee and at the meeting for another matter, said the extensive debate the city held over the beekeeping ordinance in 2006 ultimately decided that requiring consent “could have a chilling effect on putting up beehives in Evanston.”
But Ald. Delores Holmes, 5th, reminded Wynne that in that debate there wasn’t “a life and death situation,” such as in the Schwartz’s case.
Holmes expressed interest in the city setting aside land in such cases.
“I think there could be alternatives to this happening,” she said. “I’m not allergic but I wouldn’t want a (beehive) next to my house. Certainly, as a resident and taxpayer, just like (the Schwartzs), I would want to have to have some input.”
Officials plan to bring back proposed ordinance changes, reflecting the suggestions, to the committee at its June meeting. Eventually, any changes to the ordinance would have to be voted on by the full City Council.
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