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On Oct. 14, 2015, the Los Angeles City Council voted to make beekeeping legal in Los Angeles after the practice had been banned for 136 years. The ordinance, which the mayor still must sign, includes buffer zones, the requirement that beekeepers provide hives with a water source and it limited to the backyards of single family homes, NPR reports.
The ban was originally put in place in 1879 for what Environmental Policy professor Mark Vallianatos calls preposterous reasons. “Having noted the affinity between bees and fruit trees, they reasoned that bees attacked and damaged fruit, and concluded that outlawing bees was the best way to preserve crops.”
Scientists have since refuted that belief and they, as well as, farmers and other supports, are likely happy to learn of the council’s recent unanimous vote. According to Associated Press, Councilman Paul Koretz said before the voting, “To bee or not to bee; that is the question. But there is no question. We must have bees.”
Yes we must.
