Marlborough committee unanimously advances ban on rodent poisons on city property

MARLBOROUGH — March 31, 2025 — Marlborough committee advances ban on second-generation rodenticides on city property. The Legislative and Legal Affairs Committee voted 3-0 Monday to recommend an ordinance adding a new article to Chapter 250 prohibiting SGARs on all city-owned buildings, parks, open spaces and rights-of-way, binding municipal employees and contractors alike. Board of Health Director John Dinwiddie endorsed the order with an amendment striking an emergency-waiver clause, which the committee accepted; Conservation Commissioner Priscilla Ryder also backed it. Marlborough wildlife rehabilitator Alyssa Giaquinto told councilors a poisoned rodent can carry "six to seven times the lethal dose" by the time it dies, citing a barred owl found a quarter-mile from a brodifacoum bait box outside the Marlborough Police Department and a litter of three-week-old red fox kits killed on Elm Street. The committee asked the council to suspend its rules and take up the measure at its next meeting.