Over the last several years, legislative attempts in
Texas have been made to stop the theft of rare cactuses from the deserts.
A bill filed in 2003 would have mandated that all cactuses shipped include a tag from the Texas Department of Agriculture verifying their origin. To the benefit of the industry, this legislation was ultimately vetoed by Gov. Rick Perry.
As our industry knows, we have members who ship up to 1 million small cactuses at one time, and this legislation would have mandated a document for each one.
In the most recent legislative session, which ended in May, similar legislation was filed once again. In this bill, changes were made that would have required TDA to issue certificates for every 25 cactuses grown and shipped. Shipping 5,000 cactuses would have required 200 documents.
People making the mistake of not having these documents would be subject to fines up to $1,000 and/or imprisonment up to 180 days for each count. The proposed legislation did not stipulate who would pay for processing all of this documentation.
Laws are already written stating it’s illegal to trespass on private or state land, and it’s also illegal to steal. So there’s no real need for new laws to protect the native cactus population.
These new proposals amounted to overregulation and would have had very little effect on the thieves or cactus preservation.
This new legislation ultimately failed because it did not receive a hearing in the House Committee on Agriculture. We won this battle again.
- Jim Reaves
Jim Reaves is director of legislative and regulatory affairs, Texas Nursery & Landscape Association, (800) 880-0343;
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