Sheridan passing the buck?

Giving control of pesticides to municipalities comes with bylaw enforcement, cost issues

In some ways, Finance, Energy and Municipal Affairs Minister Wes Sheridan is passing the buck by giving individual P.E.I. municipalities the power to regulate or ban cosmetic pesticides. Mr. Sheridan says he will table legislative amendments in the upcoming fall session of the P.E.I. legislature.

It’s rare for the province to agree on a devolution of powers unless there is a direct benefit.

Municipalities should be careful of what they wish for. With the power to ban cosmetic pesticides comes the responsibility and costs to enforce those bylaws and prosecute offenders. The minister made it plain that municipalities will be solely responsible for those costs.

In the minister’s defence, Charlottetown, Stratford and Cornwall all requested the authority to control pesticides in their jurisdictions. It’s a very popular issue among candidates for mayor and council right now in municipal elections coming up Nov. 3.

It appears Mr. Sheridan is going to make the legislative changes wide-ranging, so that any municipal government with the ability to put bylaws in place would be able to make a decision on cosmetic pesticides and enforce it themselves.

Many communities, who don’t have bylaw officers or can’t afford enforcement, won’t be passing any such bylaws. That means much of the province will be without any safeguards involving cosmetic pesticides. It’s likely that only our two cities and our larger towns will be passing such enabling legislation. So instead of tightening the controls on cosmetic pesticides across P.E.I., the result might actually be the opposite.

The minister is likely quite happy to have this thorny issue removed from his agenda but it should be noted the requests came only because the province refused to act decisively on this issue, which is of great concern to many people in urban communities. The province stalled so municipalities stepped forward.

The provincial government took lightweight action on cosmetic pesticides in 2010 when the Department of Environment banned just one type of pesticide, 2, 4-D, in addition to some other general restrictions and guidelines.

Municipalities must now decide if the perfect lawn is worth the risk of endangering the health of neighbours and residents. The answer will most likely be a resounding no.

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