Farmers and business groups hailed Gov. Ron DeSantis for signing into law an update of the state’s right-to-farm law that aims to better protect farmers from nuisance lawsuits as the state’s population grows and more people move to rural areas.
DeSantis signed Senate Bill 88 into law last week after the measure passed by wide, bipartisan margins in both houses of Florida’s legislature. The bill expands the provisions of the right-to-farm law to include “agritourism” operations and raises the bar for nuisance lawsuits against farmers to a clear and convincing evidence standard.
The bill gives farms that comply with best management regulations and environmental rules a green light to operate without fear of civil litigation related to neighbors’ complaints about such things as noise, odors or particle emissions, according to a financial analysis of the legislation.
“We have fully supported SB 88 through the entire legislative process and are extremely grateful that Gov. DeSantis took the bold action to sign it into law,” Adam Basford, the Florida Farm Bureau Federation’s director of state legislative affairs, told the Florida Record. “We believe it provides certainty for producers in every sector of agriculture. It allows farmers who comply with all applicable rules and regulations to operate without fear of nuisance lawsuits.”
The signing of the bill also won applause from Bill Herrle, the state executive director for the National Federation of Independent Business. The bill provides a needed overhaul of the state’s original right-to-farm law, which was passed more than four decades ago.
“SB 88 is a much-needed update that expands and modernizes that decades-old law to provide stronger liability protections for the farmers who work every day to ensure Floridians and other Americans have food on their tables,” Herrle said in a prepared statement. “Farmers who follow ordinary agricultural and management practices shouldn’t have to worry about zealous trial lawyers hoping for a quick settlement.”
Lena Juarez, executive director of the Florida Agritourism Association, added her support for the new law as well.
“Agritourism provides visitors to Florida’s farms and ranches a place to play and helps farmers diversify their income,” Juarez said in a statement. “Of the 47,000 farms across our state, most are small farms, and agritourism adds value to every acre.”
SB 88 will also restrict compensatory damages in a private nuisance lawsuit against a farmer to the proven drop in market value of the plaintiff’s property that results from the farm operation.