Abandon piecemeal approaches

Few Chico residents believe that dragging stuffed couches into the street and setting them afire is a good thing. The smoke given off is toxic, and firefighters are required to respond to fires that are entirely preventable—124 in 2014 alone.

Most if not all of the couches are pulled off front porches before being burned, so it’s understandable why the Chico City Council, at the behest of the Fire Department, recently passed an ordinance banning stuffed furniture on front porches.

But that makes it illegal to have a couch on the front porch simply because couches elsewhere have been pulled off front porches and set on fire. It presumes a violation (starting a fire) before one occurs. That’s not how laws are supposed to work.

Like the update to the noise ordinance passed in November, this was another example of the council’s piecemeal approach to dealing with the problems in student neighborhoods—problems that require a disproportionate amount of police and, as we now know, Fire Department attention.

On several occasions a Chico couple, Melinda Vasquez and Ken Fleming, have called the council’s attention to Fort Collins, Colo., a residential university town much like Chico that has developed a comprehensive approach to its annual influx of young people. On its website, the city has a 145-page “Landlord-Tenant Handbook” that provides a wide range of information about leases and security deposits and other practical matters. But it goes much further, discussing neighborhood nuisance codes (including noise violations), animal codes and neighborhood relations, mediation services and activities that promote good relations among students, landlords and homeowners.

Fort Collins’ comprehensive, preventive approach has reduced the need for police patrols in student neighborhoods, saved taxpayer money, and reduced friction between students and their homeowner neighbors. Chico should follow that city’s example.