A bamboo plant. (Photo: Artep/ Flickr)
It’s official. New plantings of bamboo and other invasive plants are illegal in Brick following a second vote on a revised ordinance this week.
“There have been property owners who have had some serious problems and have not been able to remedy them because our ordinance was not really effective,” said Council President Susan Lydecker, on why the original ordinance from 2011 was updated.
No one spoke in opposition to the changed during a public hearing before the unanimous vote on Oct. 7 in favor of passing the ordinance.
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Examples of invasive plants banned under the ordinance include ragweed, multi flora rose, kudzu-vine and poison ivy or oak, but most prominently, bamboo. Bamboo chutes have been known to spread rapidly, and in the past have destroyed pools and sidewalks on neighboring properties as they spread underground and pierce their way through buried objects.
The previous ordinance only required residents to control the spread of such plants beyond their property. It did not enact a prohibition on planting.
In addition to prohibiting new plantings, the revised ordinance also calls for residents who already have such plants in the ground to control them from spreading by installing a “physical barrier” to ensure they do not encroach onto a neighboring property.
Also, the revised ordinance sets a deadline of 30 days for residents to remove plants that either lack the physical barriers needed to control them or were planted after the ordinance became effective.
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