Missouri Sunflower Man Battles City For Years For Inexplicable Reasons

The city of St. Peters, Missouri has been battling for
four years to force homeowner Chris Bank to get
rid of the annual sunflower display in his yard.

OK, I admit this post is only tangentially related to climate and weather, but it is about nature, so close enough.   

It's also one of the most inexplicable, infuriating legal battles I've ever seen.

Chris Bank of St. Peters, Missouri has grown a whole bunch of sunflowers in his yard since 2020.  And why not? They're pretty, pollinators love them, birds probably do, too, and it's a nice alternative from a boring lawn. 

The city of St. Peters doesn't feel the same way. All this hysteria against Bank and his sunflowers originated in 2021 as complaints from a homeowner's association. 

(Pro tip: NEVER buy a house in a neighborhood with an HOA.)

St. Peters officials enthusiastically joined the fray on the side of the HOA. Bank keeps finding loopholes that allow him to keep the sunflowers. The city also keeps changing the rules to coerce Bank into getting rid of all this sunny blooms,  but he won't budge.

I don't blame him. I don't know about you, but a sunflower always puts me in a better mood. The more sunflowers, the better the mood. 

The first year of the battle was in 2022.  St. Peters officials said he violated a rule in which the property need to have at least 50 percent grass coverage. But the property did have that much grass. It was just that sunflowers were also growing up through the grass.

Talk about micromanaging! A city telling people exactly how much lawn they should have?  Do they dictate which flowers, trees must be planted? What color car is parked in the garage? Where does it end? 

In 2023, Bank said the city revised the ordinance to allow enforcement via interpretation rather than measurement. A municipal judge find him. Bank appeared and the case was going to go to a jury in St. Charles County, Missouri. 

The city then withdrew its charges, probably because no sane jury would object to Bank's sunflowers, though St. Peters officials said they withdrew because the sunflowers had been removed. By the time they got around to the jury trial, it was November, so the sunflowers were gone for the season. 

Last year, a miserable woman trespassed and cut down at least 600 of the sunflowers in Bank's yard. She was caught on surveillance tape. He contacted police but prosecutors refused to take action, even though the identity of the vandal is known. She got away with it scot free. 

Because I'm sure some cranks in town thought the woman was a hero not the villain she was. 

This year, the city tried again by classifying sunflowers as a crop and limiting them to 10 percent of a  front yard. He's refused to remove his plants and is scheduled for another court appearance in September.  

Bank is the kind of rebel I can really get behind. He told Fox 2 in St. Louis that he won't give up, no matter how many times the city of St. Peters tries to change the ordinances. "I'm not going to quit this fight until this gets settled - at least settled the correct way," he said. 

 

Trump Executive Order Targets Vermont "Climate Superfund" Law

One of Donald Trump's zillions of executive orders 
specifically targets "climate superfund" laws in
Vermont and New York, but whether the order has
any legal teeth is entirely another question. 

To nobody's surprise and to lots of eye rolling in Vermont, Donald Trump released an executive order targeting the state's climate superfund law.  

Trump says the law "extorts" energy producers. 

The law would work much like the federal Superfund law that's been around for decades. 

Under the Vermont climate superfund law, a company that produces large amounts of carbon dioxide would have to pay a share of what climate change has cost Vermont, based on how much the company contributed to global emissions during the same period

Not long after Vermont adopted its climate superfund law, New York followed suit with a similar law. Trump's executive order takes aim at both states.

Trump's characteristically whiny order states:

"New York, for example, a 'climate change' extortion law that seeks to retroactively impose billions in fines (erroneously labelled 'compensatory payments') on traditional energy producers for their purported past contributions to greenhouse gas emissions not only in New York but also anywhere in the United States and the world.

Vermont similarly extorts energy producers for alleged past contributions to greenhouse gas emissions anywhere in the United States or the globe."

That's not quite right because the laws do take into account the targeted companies' overall emissions, the laws only seek to receive compensation for the expense of climate change in those states. 

The executive  order is not just about New York and Vermont and their climate superfund laws. 

Per Vermont Public: 

"The document broadly seeks to restrict states' abilities to set local energy policy, particularly policies that support climate action or renewables like solar and wind, or that impeded the development of new domestic energy sources."

With his executive order, Trump is sticking his nose into something that is already being litigated through the courts. 

The fossil fuel industry is already suing Vermont and New York regarding this law. In a normal world, without Trump, this would be litigated through the courts to determine whether these climate superfund laws are constitutional or not. 

But that's not the world we live in now. King Trump, or so he thinks can just wave his magic orange wand and everybody will just bend to his will.

Until they don't. 

Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark, of one, is unimpressed. 

She told Vermont Public that Trump's order has no legal teeth and as no bearing on Vermont's enforcement of its own laws.

"The president has a lot of power; he does not have the extent of the power  he wishes he had, which is why we see all these executive order that say a lot of words but don't actually do anything.....And this is another one of those examples."

Clark felt compelled to offer this basic elementary school civics lesson to Trump:

"Congress passes the laws. The executive branch, the president, carries out the instructions of Congress, and it's the courts that get to interpret the laws."

There are legitimate legal questions about the Climate Superfund laws, such as whether it interferes with interstate commerce.  The fossil fuel industry also questions whether companies should be held responsible for the actions of society at large. 

Under the executive order, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has about two months to simple a report and recommend actions to prevent states from engaging in climate policy she deems illegal.

Again, that's really up to the courts and not Bondi or Trump to decide. We hope. But there will be court appeals, no matter what happens. 

The fossil fuel industry is not just relying on the courts.  It appears that Trump's executive order has to do with a meeting oil executive had with Trump earlier this year. In that meeting, they asked Trump for help in fighting the Vermont and New York climate superfund laws, as the Washington Post reported in March. 

Apparently, the oil executives got what they wanted.    

New York Takes Vermont's Lead, Establishes Climate "Superfund" Law

Following Vermont's lead from last year, New York
Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation creating a
"climate superfund" to force fossil fuel polluters
 to help pay for climate related damages in the state.

 Vermont lawmakers made waves last spring when the state adopted a law that requires fossil fuel companies and other big polluters to pay for climate related damage all those emissions have and will cause the state. 

The law faces an uncertain future because, as you might imagine the fossil fuel companies are not happy with this idea and will sue. 

But other states have taken a keen interest in Vermont's law, and it's starting to snowball. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed into law a bill similar to Vermont's earlier this month. 

Per the Washington Post: 

"The bill...... would allow the state to fine the biggest greenhouse gas emitters a total of $75 billion, to be paid over 25 years into a fund based on their contributions to overall emissions between 2000 and 2018.

That money would be used to pay for the damage already done to homes, roads and bridges - and help cover the cost of preparing for increasingly extreme weather in the years come."

Fossil fuel lobbyists reacted to the New York legislation pretty much the same way they did when Vermont passed their own climate superfund law.  WaPo again:

"New York's law is almost certain to face legal challenges. The American Petroleum Institute, the oil and gas industry's powerful lobbying group, sent state lawmakers a memo in 2023 saying the proposed bill was unconstitutional. A could would probably strike it down, the group did, because it was preempted by federal law and sought to hold companies responsible for the actions of society at large."

Plus, there's the ever-present problem of the incoming Trump administration. Sigh. 

I think this type of law has merit, but buckle up for a long, long legal fight over this. 

 

California, Maryland and Massachusetts have been considering similar laws, but so far no climate superfund bill has made it to the governors desk in any of those states. 

 

 

Environmental Group Sues State Of Vermont Over Greenhouse Emissions

The Conservation Law Foundation is suing Vermont
over its greenhouse emissions targets.

 An issue as wide ranging and ever present as climate change inevitably leads to one staple of American life: The lawsuit.  

Such as it is in Green Mountain State, where last week the environmental group Conservation Law Foundation last week sued Vermont because they said the state isn't doing enough to reduce carbon emissions. 

According to Seven Days: 

"The Conservation Law Foundation accuses the Agency of Natural Resources of not taking the steps necessary to ensure that Vermont is on track to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions as required under the state's 2020 Global Warming Solutions Act."

Basically, the CLF doesn't really believe Vermont Natural Resources Secretary Julie Moore, who says the state is likely to meet its 2025 emissions target, which is 26 percent below the 2005 level.

Seven Days goes on to explain:

"The environmental group argues that this claim is based on modeling that is 'technically and mathematically insufficient.' Honest modeling 'shows that Vermont is not, and by a significant margin, on track to achieve the 2025 Reduction Requirement, the group claimed it its sued, filed on Tuesday in Washington County Superior Court."

CLF announced its intent to sue back in July, but the state didn't participate in settlement discussions. 

As is always the case when there's lawsuits, the state's response was terse. "We received notice of CLF's lawsuit and will review it. We intend to defend the Agency of Natural Resources," said Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark in a statement released shortly after the suit was announced.

The lawsuit by CLF says that Vermont should increase rules and incentives for people to install heat pumps and buy electric vehicles.

As it stands now, Vermont does have rules that require an increasing share of new cars and light trucks sold in Vermont need to be electric. By 2035 all new vehicles of this type must be EVs. 

Even Moore agrees that Vermont won't hit its 2030 targets for emissions reductions, with the regulations now in place. One tricky thing:  A LOT of Vermont homes are heated by fuel oil or wood, both of which of course release greenhouse gases. So how do you fix that?

That topic looks like it will come up in the next Vermont legislative session, which starts in January. 

Vermont - and pretty much everybody - should probably get used to climate related lawsuits, as I imagine they will be a dime a dozen. If they aren't already.

The big Vermont lawsuits will probably come as a result of a new law enacted this past spring. It's a climate "superfund" law. The first in the nation law would make fossil fuel and other industries pay for climate-related disasters that are costing the state Big Bucks.

The fossil fuel industry and others are guaranteed to sue to try and stop the law, lest other states follow suit. (Other states ARE looking at similar legislation).

If your career goal is to be an environmental lawyer, you're going to have a busy life.