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Wild Onesฎ supports weed laws that promote responsible native plant landscaping.
Vegetation Control Laws
Here is a
model municipal ordinance
encouraging the use of native plant
communities as an alternative in urban landscape design, and a sample
amending ordinance.
Bret Rappaport and Bevin Horn's article Weeding Out
Bad Vegetation Control Ordinances
is a "must read" for native landscapers in cities or suburban areas.
For a more in-depth discussion, see Bret's
law review article.
Anyone involved in a legal dispute about native plant landscaping will want
to examine the case law and opinions in this review.
Local Weed Control Ordinances
Here is a
model municipal ordinance
encouraging the use of native plant
communities as an alternative in urban landscape design, and a sample
amending ordinance.
Local Sustainable
Landscaping Control Ordinances
The federal courts (click
here to see PDF file) have
recently upheld an ordinance
from Dane County, Wisconsin,
banning use of lawn fertilizer and coal tar sealcoat
products. Therefore, any city would be well advised
to model their ordinance after that one.
Developing a Weed Ordinance
It is a municipality's obligation to promote and encourage the control of invasive non-native plant species in the landscape. To learn how to help the municipality develop a new weed law, read the article presented in the July 2005 issue of Plants out of Place, the newsletter of the Invasive Plants Association of Wisconsin, page 9, entitled "Developing Municipal Weed Laws" written by Donna VanBuecken.
When Cities Grow Wild - Natural Landscaping from an Urban Planning Perspective
by John Ingram
For the most part, the tapestry of parks, private gardens and formal open spaces that make up the vegetated urban landscape are a disturbing reflection of an aesthetic preference and cultural tradition out of step with current environmental, ecological and societal realities.
Why? The landscapes are dependent on constant and expensive energy inputs to retain their cultivated forms. Their maintenance is responsible for considerable environmental degradation through the pollution it causes (lawn mower emissions, herbicide and pesticide run-off, etc.). And they perpetuate our dated cultural attitudes concerning nature in the city and the relationship between human society and the environment. In short, most urban greenspaces suffer many of the same environmental shortcomings that the advocates of schoolground naturalization use to justify their projects.
This is a strange fact. If we are trying to teach our youth to be good environmental stewards, should we not be teaching by example? Should not municipalities as the protectors and guardians of public and environmental health seek to apply the same successful programs to its own properties? Should not private homeowners reevaluate their own landscaping practices as a matter of public responsibility? Why should the benefits so clearly linked to naturalization be restricted almost exclusively to schoolgrounds?
"When Cities Grow Wild - Natural Landscaping from an Urban Planning Perspective" addresses these questions and the larger issues to which they are related. In light of the successes of the schoolground naturalization movement, it questions the value of the current urban landscape ethic, examines its associated environmental and economic problems, and makes the case for the adoption of naturalization, or natural landscaping as an alternative design approach that better reflects current ecological and fiscal realities.
You Don't Have to Fight City Hall
by Bret Rappaport
Realizing that municipalities have an obligation to promote and encourage native landscaping is the first step in getting what you want. Your job (our job) is to show local governments how and why native landscaping is good for everyone so they'll stop working against us and start working with us.
Here's how to get started:
You Don't Have to Fight City Hall.
May All Your Weeds Be Wildflowers.
The Johnny Appleseed Model of Getting Municipal Ordinances Passed.
How One Person Can Help
in a Small Way to Change the Course
of a Non-Conservation-Minded World
by Charlotte Adelman
One person can make a difference. Every small step helps our environment.
Local Press
Releases
Creve Coeur St. Louis, MO Area: Weed Ordinances
to Promote Environmentally-Friendly Planting Methods
The Town of Greenville (Outagamie County, Wisconsin)
has recently banned the use of phosphorus in lawn
fertilizers.
The Town of Oconomowoc (Waukesha County, Wisconsin)
approved an ordinance banning the use by town residents
of lawn fertilizers containing phosphorus. When you get to the web page, scroll down to find the phosphorus fertilizer article.
Jason Rohrer successfully appealed the ruling
that his landscape was in violation of Potsdam Village
(County of St. Lawrence, New York) Code section 145-6
A & B, pertinently part: Section 145-6. Brush, grass
and weeds.
EPA: Green Landscaping With
Native Plants
See what the Environmental Protection Agency has
to say about Green
Landscaping with Native Plants. This
narrative includes:
An
Introduction to Natural Landscaping Movement
The
Land Ethic
A
History of Weed Laws and the Battle Over Them
The
Reason for and Response to the Natural Landscape
Movement
Some
Villages Still Don't Get It
Where
to Go From Here
Conclusions
Footnotes and Appendices
Executive Order
On February 3, 1999, President Clinton signed Executive Order 13112 (E.O.) which calls on Executive Branch agencies to work to prevent and control the introduction and spread of invasive species. | 