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ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT Meeting Date: June 19, 2012 Action Agenda Item No. SUBJECT: Resolution of Approval — Conserving Native Wildflowers on Roadways DEPARTMENT: Environment, Agriculture, Parks PUBLIC HEARING: (Y /N) No and Recreation (DEAPR) ATTACHMENTS INFORMATION CONTACT: 1. Draft resolution David Stancil, 245 -2510 2. Photos of native plants in roadway Rich Shaw, 245 -2514 3. CFE memo & resolution (Nov. 2009) 4. CFE memo (Dec. 2006) PURPOSE: To consider a resolution to approve of a plan to implement voluntary roadside management practices that will increase the visibility, enjoyment, and conservation of native wildflowers along some of the roadways in Orange County. BACKGROUND: Over the past few years the Commission for the Environment (CFE) has examined the use of herbicides to control the growth of vegetation on roadsides and utility rights -of -way, and the adverse effects of herbicides on certain roadsides that provide habitat for a variety of native plants, some of which are rare in Orange County. In 2009 the CFE adopted a resolution recommending that all use of herbicides to manage roadsides and utility rights -of -way be discontinued in Orange County, and that mowing be reinstated as the sole means of managing unwanted vegetation in those areas. That resolution was a follow -up to a December 2006 memo to the BOCC in which the CFE reported on this subject. Copies of those documents are attached. After further consideration, the CFE is of the opinion that banning the use of herbicides on roadsides and utility corridors is unlikely, and may not be warranted. Rather than protecting all roadsides, regardless of their value as habitat for native plants, the CFE recommends a more prudent approach would be to identify those areas that are uniquely important and work with landowners and utility managers to conserve them. The CFE will enlist help from professional biologists to organize a team of volunteers to survey county roadsides at different periods of the 2012 -13 growing seasons (i.e., early summer, mid - summer, autumn) to identify areas that are most worthy of protection. The CFE and other volunteers would contact the landowners and the utilities to request their cooperation in protecting these areas from herbicide use. They would ask that vegetation in those areas be controlled by mechanical means (i.e., mowing), which is how all roadsides used to be maintained. Mowing is currently used on county roadsides where owners have asked that no herbicides be applied.