Every Los Gatos neighborhood deserves the same basic standard: clean curbs, clear sightlines, and homes that reflect the pride residents take in them. In 2010, the Town Council made that vision official, creating Chapter 30 of the Town Code — "Neighborhood Preservation" — to protect the quality, character, and property values of every residential street in town.

We're asking the Town Council to complete that vision with one simple addition to Chapter 30: a new Section 30.10.035, providing that a resident's trash, recycling, and yard waste containers be placed for collection in front of that resident's own home — not a neighbor's.

Today, the code addresses only when containers may be out: under existing Section 30.10.030(d), garbage receptacles may not be visible from the public right-of-way except within 24 hours of the scheduled collection time. Nothing in the code addresses where along the street those containers belong. The proposed Section 30.10.035 fills exactly that gap. Its core language is simple:

"Residential solid waste containers... shall be placed out for collection only in front of the account holder's own property for which solid waste collection service is billed, where that property has street frontage sufficient to accommodate such placement."

To be clear, this isn't about ownership or control of the frontage. The frontage is usually Town-owned, and the street is definitely Town property. This is about a neighborly common courtesy: not putting one's trash in front of someone else's house or property.

This standard matters everywhere in Los Gatos, but it works differently across our town — and the proposal is written for that. Downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods have small lots, narrow frontages, and real competition for street parking, where a neighbor's containers can take up a large share of a home's entire frontage. Our hillsides have flag lots, shared private driveways, and easement-access properties where "your own frontage" needs a clear definition. The proposed section provides practical placement rules for each condition:

Flag lots — containers go where the accessway meets the public street;
Shared private roads and driveways — containers go at the shared access point, without spilling onto the frontage of homes the private road doesn't serve;

Easement-access properties — where an easement is a property's only way to reach the street, containers go where the easement meets the street; an easement alone never creates a right to place containers in front of a neighbor's home; and

Written consent — neighbors can always agree, in writing, to a different arrangement that works for them — modeled on a rule already in force in Santa Clara County's own code.

And it asks almost nothing of Town staff or the Town budget. This proposal creates no new department, no permit process, no inspections, and no new enforcement program. The Town already enforces container rules under Section 30.10.030(d) today — this simply adds a placement standard to a section Code Enforcement already administers, responding to complaints the same way it already does. Each placement rule resolves itself by the physical layout of the lot or by written agreement between neighbors — no Town determinations, no hauler approvals, no ongoing administration. Monte Sereno, one of our neighboring West Valley communities, already enforces this exact standard with no dedicated resources at all.

It's the courtesy nearly every Los Gatos resident already extends without being asked. Writing it into the Town Code simply gives Neighborhood Preservation the full reach it was always meant to have.

Sign this petition to ask the Los Gatos Town Council to review and adopt proposed Section 30.10.035 as an addition to Chapter 30, Neighborhood Preservation.