PFAs regulations bill comes to a halt after MD Crossover Day

Annapolis, Md. – This year’s Maryland General Assembly saw certain legislation regarding PFAs, also known as forever chemicals, come to a halt after yesterday’s Crossover Day. House Bill 1022 and Senate Bill 686 focused on phasing out products and tightening registration requirements that contained PFAs.

The bills meant to prohibit manufactures from selling or distributing certain products containing PFAs on or after a certain time and establishing more testing and regulations. According to Del. Tom Hutchinson (R-District 37B), proponents of the legislation had wanted to ban PFA chemicals outright, not giving distributers and industries enough time to make the necessary changes and making those who need to use pesticides suffer. He said, though he agrees that PFAs need to be taken out of the overall environment, he said the process needed to be more gradual to be effective.

“I understand and appreciate that there are issues with PFAs, but you need to start somewhere,” Hutchinson said. “And unfortunately, the advocates are unwilling to ever compromise, and as such, actually they withdrew the bill yesterday from my committee.”

Hutchinson serves on the health committee.