The drafting, development, and potential implementation of Bill 52-14 in Montgomery County, Maryland, has drawn out over the last few years. The bill, which aimed to prohibit the use of certain pesticides on private and County-owned properties throughout Montgomery County and scheduled to take effect in 2018, was recently challenged in the County's Circuit Court and overturned by Judge Terrence McGann. While the golf industry was exempt from the bill, the industry still supported RISE (Responsible Industry for Sound Environment), and much of the local green industry in their fight against halting this bill.
The decision comes after years of advocating and educating the county council, local community members, and attending public hearings discussing the ban's possible consequences, should it be enacted. And while the county council eventually signed the bill into ordinance, a civil action was filed shortly thereafter by Complete Lawn Care et. al and Anita Goodman et. al (consolidated as the plaintiffs) vs. Montgomery County, Maryland (the defendant).
Judge McGann ultimately ruled that "by generally banning the use of registered pesticides, the Ordinance prohibits and frustrates activity that is intended to be permitted by state law, which conflicts with, and is thus, preempted by state law. The county's ordinance flout's decades of state primacy in ensuring safe and proper pesticide use, undermines the State's system of comprehensive and uniform product approval and regulation, and prohibits products and conduct that have been affirmatively approved and licensed by the State." Thereby it was ordered that the Plaintiffs' motion be granted, and Bill 52-14 should not be allowed to take effect.
The decision was a big win for the green industry, and stories ran in the Washington Post and Bethesda Beat.
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