SAVE WATERTOWN WILDLIFE

Heather Packard, from Mass Audubon, provided the following update on the status of the House bill to restrict anticoagulant rodenticide (AR) usage. TL;DR: The amendment to the House budget that would have restricted the use of ARs was not adopted. Now our focus is on incorporating the statewide ban on ARs in the House version of the Mass Ready Act.

“Over 3 days of debate, the House of Representatives considered over 1700 amendments to a nearly 300-page budget bill that funds the Massachusetts state government for the next fiscal year.  One of those amendments – number 322 – was the text of Rep. Hawkins’ rodenticide bill, which, if passed into law, would phase out the use of deadly and dangerous rodenticide poisons that are harming our wildlife and pets.

Unfortunately, while the amendment was considered as part of the budget’s Consolidated Amendment F, the text of Amendment 322 was not adopted. This wasn’t a surprising result, as the Legislature prefers not to make policy in the budget.  But it was a great opportunity for you to engage with your State Representatives and have conversations about the issue, and 76 Reps (a comparatively high number) cosponsored the amendment!   

We’re going to take that momentum and keep pushing our State Reps to get a statewide ban on anticoagulant rodenticides included in the House version of the Mass Ready Act, which we anticipate will come up for debate sometime in June or July.  Stay tuned in next week for more information on our advocacy strategy!”