The Partial Observer by Jessie Ravage

An Objection to Recreational Wood Burning Fire Pits in Cooperstown

I am here to ask the trustees to consider ways to reduce the use of recreational wood burning fire pits in the village. Like many municipalities in the state, Cooperstown relies on Section 307 of the state fire code to regulate recreational wood burning fire pits. The code mainly addresses potential loss of property through poor siting and lack of oversight by fire pit owners. While it does prohibit “open burning” that is “offensive” or “objectionable,” that is a gray area.

Wood burning fire pits create localized pockets of wood smoke that smell as much as the wood smoke from Canada, and the smell persists after a fire pit goes out, sometimes for several hours. Every year, more village residents buy into the nostalgia of sitting around a campfire. Walking around the village on any summer evening, you can smell wood smoke in most neighborhoods.

Numerous third-party studies show that wood smoke, while natural, is bad for us. If you smell wood smoke, it is damaging your lungs with particulate matter. It may be poisoning you, too, because it carries toxins. Some of these toxins, like benzene and formaldehyde, are known carcinogens.

The EPA identifies children and older people, especially those with compromised lung function, as being at the highest risk. The 2020 census recorded that nearly a quarter of households in Cooperstown include children under 18. Nearly a fifth of households include at least one person over 65. That suggests an elevated risk from wood smoke to roughly half of Cooperstown households. This summer, we’ve been told on several days to avoid being outdoors, close up our houses and run filtration systems to reduce exposure when the Air Quality Index is above 100 due to Canadian wood smoke.

I’ve worried that I’m being cranky about this, but I’ve talked with others who are experiencing local wood smoke exposure, too. Recreational wood burning fire pits are as harmful as second-hand cigarette smoke, much more so than charcoal and gas grills, which burn at higher temperatures and so pose a lower health risk. But in that smalltown way, we’re avoiding confrontation and putting up with a public health risk.

Recreational wood burning fire pits in densely settled places like the village clearly impinge on the human rights of surrounding neighbors to peacefully enjoy their property, especially at a time of year when we want to be outdoors. We can’t do much about Canadian wildfires, but we can take action to protect village residents from wood smoke generated by recreational wood burning fire pits. This is about the human right to a healthful environment.

I encourage the village trustees to go beyond a fire code that is about protecting property and act on their mandate to protect village residents from an identified, locally-generated risk to our health. A few municipalities in the state have already gone beyond the state building code. I’ve provided a list of sources that includes two of them. The problem is growing in Cooperstown, and it turns out I’m not alone in thinking the time has come for action. Education seems to be the first step. I can offer ideas.

Sources for further reading:

Section 307 of the NYS fire code. This primarily addresses potential risk to property via conflagration. Section 307.1.1 does speak to burning that is “offensive” or “objectionable,” but offers no way to measure that. (https://up.codes/s/open-burning-and-recreational-fires)

Articles about wood smoke as health risk:

Several of the sites below are national; some come from western states where awareness has risen more quickly than in the Northeast wildfires. All are third-party sites from federal and state agencies or nonprofit organizations. Some focus on the localized emissions produced by outdoor woodburning furnaces, which work at low temperatures, increasing smokiness similar to that often generated by backyard woodburning firepits.

“Wood smoke and your health,” 2026. (https://cdphe.colorado gov/apcd/wood-smoke-and-your-health)

“Wood Smoke and Your Health,” EPA, updated 2025. (https://www.epa.gov/burnwise/wood-smoke-and-your-health)

“Tobacco parallels, Secondhand smoke,” November 2025 (https://www.dsawsp.org/secondhand-smoke/overview)

Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), 2024. See the infographic at the bottom of this web page. (https://www.env-health.org/new-infographic-on-the-health-and-climate-threat-from-wood-burning/)

“Wood Smoke,” Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, 2023 or 2024. (https://www.pca.state.mn.us/air-water-land-climate/wood-smoke)

“How Wood Smoke Harms Your Health,” Publication #91-br-023. (https://apps.ecology.wa.gov/publications/documents/91br023.pdf)

“Natural, but Harmful. Wood Smoke and Health, Doctors and Scientists Against Wood Smoke Pollution,” post-2020 based on internal citation. (https://www.dsawsp.org/health/overview)

“Lovely but dangerous, wood fires bring health risks,” American Heart Association, 2019. (https://www.heart.org/en/news/2019/12/13/lovely-but-dangerous-wood-fires-bring-health-risks)

“Woodsmoke health effects: a review,” NIH, National Library of Medicine, 2007. (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17127644/)

Potential sample ordinances in New York State:

Village of Scotia: https://ecode360.com/9174390

Town of Wilton: https://townofwilton.ny.gov/residents/restricted-residential-burning-law/

Jessie Ravage is a longtime Village of Cooperstown resident and a regional and independent historian.