Barrington Hills stuck on lighting rules' timing

After 10 months of honing the details of a controversial outdoor lighting ordinance, Barrington Hills zoning board members hope to answer one final question Wednesday:

When - if ever - should all the regulations in the ordinance take effect?

Concerned about the impact on homeowners who may have purchased expensive outdoor lighting fixtures in recent years, some zoning board members Monday appeared shy at the end about saying when the new restrictions would actually be enforced.

"I just don't want there to be anything punitive," zoning board member Karen Rosene said. "I don't think people should incur any kind of cost."

But Wednesday is when the zoning board will consider assigning such a date to the draft ordinance before considering recommending its approval by the village board.

The proposed ordinance has certainly had its share of critics since last October, mainly in the form of the opposition group HALO, Homeowners Against Lighting Ordinances.

Despite the last-minute hesitation of some zoning board members to assign a start date to the ordinance, HALO co-founder Dede Wamberg said her group remains strongly opposed to any increase in regulations and infringement on property rights.

The ordinance would limit the amount of lighting homeowners can keep on all night to 10,000 lumens per acre. Residential property in Barrington Hills has a minimum lot size of five acres.

While a lumen is difficult to define without measuring equipment, zoning board Chairman Jonathan Knight said a 75-watt bulb generates a little more than 1,000 lumens.

Security lighting and holiday lights have been exempted from the 10,000-lumen-per-acre limit, but it was only last month that security lighting was finally defined.

Under the ordinance, security lighting would be considered lighting that is turned on manually or by a motion detector in response to an actual intrusion or emergency, and turned off as soon as the incident is resolved.

Some of the proposed regulations in the ordinance were assigned dates by which property owners will be expected to comply.

For instance, the use of mercury-vapor lighting would be banned for environmental health reasons on Jan. 1, 2012. That's also the date by which Barrington Hills' few nonresidential properties, including five churches, must meet their own new standards that include a 11 p.m. shut-off of nonessential lighting.

The ordinance also specifies a 15-foot height limit on lighting that would be enforced five years after approval.

Knight emphasized that enforcement of the ordinance would be done on a complaint basis and that the village would not be actively sending "light police" throughout the community to measure lighting levels.

If the zoning board votes on a recommendation Wednesday, the village board would consider it no earlier than its Sept. 27 meeting.

Lights: Enforcement to be by complaint, no 'light police'