February Council Meeting - Garage Sale Ordinance

The February Council Meeting is tomorrow night, 7pm. I am unable to attend due to previous obligations, but I wanted to share something with everyone, and I hope that more people will attend.

On the Minerva Park Website, there is an Ordinance to be read tomorrow about Garage Sales.

The legislation is available here: http://minervapark.org/legislation/2012/01-2012_garage-sales.doc

This includes limiting sales to 3 days maximum, 9am to 6pm, permits (with fee) required 3 days in advance, which includes giving permission to any Minerva Park personnel to inspect the sale, signs are restricted in size and format in that they must be free-standing and not have balloons, streamers, or other attention catching attachments.

The list goes on, so I encourage residents to read the legislation. Speak up if you are dissatisfied with it. Not just here, either!! Go to the meetings, send e-mails, talk to "your" council members. Document it, if you can, because that's the only way to keep them honest at this point. That's why I do it.

I do see the value in limiting sales to keep our neighborhood from becoming a swap meet, but really, is this an issue at present? Do we need to limit the specific hours residents can have sales? What about summer time when it's daylight until 9pm and maybe people have to work until 5, and people are out and about in the evening? And two per year? That's it, even if you co-host?

And what about the MPCA garage sale? Does that count as one of your two per year??

These rules seem a little invasive to me, and I know I am not alone in thinking that.

-Jessica Rhoads

Garage Sale 2011

In the interest of full access and documentation, the MPCA 2011 Garage Sale Map is above. Clicking on the image should redirect you to a larger view of the image itself.