Protecting Ethnic, Cultural Foods Utilizing Coal Ovens From Environmental Regulations In NYC

Assembly member Pirozzolo introduced Assembly Bill 2023-A9698 to allow an exemption to the new environmental act that requires when coal, wood, and other materials are burned, a special air filter must be installed.  Such a requirement would be an incredible burden to smaller ethnic food establishments, particularly since there are likely to be few approved vendors of these filtration units that are registered with New York, who will be able to charge large sums for the installation. 

This issue is related to the gas stove bans that are planned or, in some cases implemented, across the US. 

The bill summary: 

2023-A9698 (ACTIVE) – SUMMARY

Staten Islander discussed the bill with Asm. Pirozzolo: 

The idea of the bill is to be able to cook ethnic foods. It’s an anti-ethnic-cooking discrimination bill. It would add an exception to the environmental law that would allow for the burning of wood and charcoal in cooking and baking, as opposed to other uses. This is a response to the City Council law that seeks to ban coal fired ovens in cooking. Greeks grill octopus, Jewish people make matzo bread, which is religious and ethnic. Italians also make pizza in coal fired brick ovens.  There are so many ethnic foods that are cooked with wood and charcoal that give it a particular flavor, and banning this destroys the culture of many different cultures.

The ridiculous thing is that when there was a story in the NY Post, there were maybe 310 or 330, as far as restaurants in NYC, perhaps in Manhattan. This is not a lot of restaurants. If you consider the older homes in Manhattan, you can buy firewood in a bodega that you can burn in your inner wood burning furnace in their homes.  This is strictly for decorative and ambiance purposes, as all homes have heating systems in them.

There are likely more people burning firewood in their fireplace for decoration and because it looks pretty, simply  because they can. One of the owners of a building on the West Side of Manhattan has four wood burning fireplaces in his apartment, and they are not using them for heat. There is no culture or ethnicity associated with that. Maybe the council should pull the permits for wood burning fireplaces. It is a much bigger issue of people burning wood in their homes.

Restaurants have an exemption for gas stoves, so they should have an exemption for wood burning stoves and charcoal as well.  This is what the new bill is designed to do: add a similar exemption for coal and wood burning stoves for restaurant in New York.  The text of the bill denotes restaurants without specific reference to ethnic foods, but the idea is the same.  We will follow up in the future on  the progress of the bill.

Banner Image: Coal burning oven. Image Credit – Ergyn Meshekran