Tampa-Hillsborough County won’t be imposing a ban on purchasing lawn fertilizer during the rainy months to cut down on nutrient runoff into the state’s waterways. The county’s environmental protection commission has approved a new rule that emphasizes education, removal of fertilizer and vegetation from sidewalks and driveways, use of lower amount of fertilizer, and the prohibition of fertilizer application near waters and wetlands, EPC Assistant Counsel Rick Muratti advised Green Markets. “But there is no rainy season application or sales restriction as initially proposed,” Muratti reported. The rule, he added, is similar to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s model for the entire state. There is also the Tampa Bay Estuary Program model ordinance adopted earlier this year by neighboring Pinellas County, which bans both the application and sale of nitrogen fertilizer in the summer rainy season, and requires that fertilizers used the rest of the year contain at least 50 percent nitrogen in slow-release form. Both the Florida Fertilizer and Agrichemical Association and the Tampa Bay Wholesale Growers, along with other related entities, pushed for a less stringent rule in Hillsborough, which hasn’t given its final approval – but that should take place before the end of the month.
Transparency Across the Fertilizer Value-Chain