Montgomery County is considering a ban on pesticides and no, not just lawn lovers are up in arms about it.

The ban, if passed, would eliminate the use of all pesticides deemed unnecessary by the county government. Every plot of mowed grass would be subject to the new law—even local sports fields like Whitman’s own Jerome Marco Stadium.

Sports organizations in the area worry that without pesticides, playing conditions on their fields would suffer as a result of an influx of weeds and insects. Leaders from BCC Baseball and the Maryland SoccerPlex have spoken out against the ban, writing testimony to public hearings and meeting with a number of county officials.

Their chief concern is that worse grass conditions as a result of the ban could lead to more twisted ankles and more torn ACLs for kids playing on the fields.

“The sports fields in Montgomery County already do not match up well with those in Virginia,” said Denise Gorham, BCC Baseball’s Executive Director. “It would be heartbreaking to disadvantage our athletes even further by allowing our sports facilities to be degraded by a lack of proper turf maintenance.”

On top of the concern over injuries, the sports organizations argue that they’ve significantly reduced their pesticide use over the past few years to the point where they only spray what’s absolutely necessary amount to maintain good playing conditions. The Maryland SoccerPlex has limited its pesticides use to 25 percent of what they sprayed six years ago, executive director Trish Heffelfinger said.

Additionally, both Heffelfinger and Gorham cite failures of similar bans in other states as support for opposing the potential law.

“In Connecticut, there is a ban on the use of pesticides on K–8 school fields. It is in its third year and at least three of their fields have had catastrophic failures,” Heffelfinger said.

Gorham wrote in her testimony about another comparable situation in New Jersey last year where a district tried to implement a completely organic field maintenance plan. According to Gorham, the results are not promising. Costs increased by over 50 percent and field conditions suffered, she said.

Alternatives to pesticides are often much more expensive. The University of Connecticut recommends that in lieu of pesticides, facilities should aggressively over-seed their fields.

“It would cost us $600,000 more in seed and $200,000 in additional irrigation water to do that,” Heffelfinger said. “We would be out of business.”

Furthermore, the economic fallout from deteriorating field conditions would stretch beyond the pocketbooks of the SoccerPlex and other sports organizations, Heffelfinger argues. If fewer athletes see the facility as desirable and go use the fields, then local restaurants and hotels lose out on business. The SoccerPlex provides an annual economic benefit of $24 million to the county and state, Heffelfinger said.

Supporters of the ban argue that carcinogens in the pesticides pose a threat to anyone who comes into contact with a sprayed area.

“I think the majority of my constituents want to see Montgomery be the cleanest, safest county in America,” Council President George Leventhal said to the Washington Post.

But the potential health issues seem to not worry Gorham and Heffelfinger much. Gorham wrote in her testimony that the common pesticide glyphosate (Roundup) isn’t even as toxic as common table salt.

One way around the regulations is to secure an exemption to the proposed ban like golf courses have. There has been some talk about doing this, and county executive Ike Leggett supports it.

However, there has been little progress made on the bill overall in the past month. The County Council has been preoccupied with passing the budget for the next fiscal year, said Washington Post writer Bill Turque, who has written multiple articles on the pesticides ban.

Heffelfinger believes that the county can still move forward on pesticides even without a ban.

“We firmly believe if consumers were made aware of the proper application and potential concerns with pesticides they would adopt better application practices.” she said. “It’s time to educate rather than regulate.”