By PAULA TRACY, InDepthNH.org
CONCORD – Releasing balloons into the atmosphere would be a form of littering punishable by a $250 fine under a bill heard in the legislature Wednesday.
The House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee heard House Bill 387 sponsored by Rep. Janet Wall, D-Dover, who said this “is a serious matter.” The committee met in the Legislative Office Building in Concord.
The implications to the environment and nature, she said, are profound and New Hampshire should join other states that consider such balloon releases a crime punishable by a fine.
A provision in the bill would also require the seller of the balloons to inform the purchaser that the release of 20 or more balloons is harmful to wildlife and that a violation is punishable by a $250 fine, and subsequent fines of $500 each.
She said it came up as a bill in 2007 and passed the House but failed in the Senate.
A constituent asked her to sponsor the bill and this is the first bill she said she has ever sponsored that did not have bipartisan support.
The bill did not have co-sponsors or public testimony offered to the committee though it was supported overwhelmingly online.
She said her constituent is a well-respected businessman who goes out fishing on the ocean and brought it to her attention because he is worried about the marine wildlife impacted by this.
“We’ve got a problem, and we need to do something about it,” Wall said. Other states, most recently Florida, passed similar bills, she said.
Other states that have such measures include Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Tennessee, Virginia, California, Hawaii and Maryland and there are cities and towns where there are ordinances banning such balloon releases.
Wall presented a New York Times article that stated balloons “don’t go to heaven” but instead to waterways, kill seabirds and increase microplastic pollution.
She said she and family members who hike have also found balloon waste in the mountains and even in her neighborhood trees.
Birds get caught in the strings and ribbons that tie balloons together.
“It’s not going to hurt the balloon industry,” she said. “It’s a lot of fun watching balloons go up in the sky but what goes up does come down.”
The bill failed in the past in part due to the enforcement which was placed on NH Fish and Game. This bill does not specify enforcement.
