One group has formed with the aim of banishing blowers from the Southwest Florida town.

“The noise, the allergens – people don’t realize you’re blowing up all kinds of things – the pesticides, the herbicides,” said Lane Cole of Citizens for a Quieter, Healthier Naples.

Landscapers respond that the whole thing is blown out of proportion.

“They’re not used that much, so I don’t see what the big deal is. I thought it was a joke at first,” said Parker Gile of Parker’s Tree Service. “About five minutes with a leaf blower will probably take an hour, hour-and-a-half with brooms.”

And Gile says more manpower means more money.

“You’ve have to pass the price onto the customer, because you can’t eat it,” said Gile.

And landscapers fear it won’t stop with leaf blowers. They’re by no means the only noisy tool needed for business.

“Trying to maintain hedges – 15 feet hedges by hand clipping them? You’d be here a couple of weeks,” said Gile.

Cole, who is heading up the effort to ban the leaf blowers, says she sees the need for clippers and chippers. But she believes leaf blowers are over-used and under-efficient.