Hold on to your balloons, Marylanders. Lawmakers approved a bill to penalize individuals $100 for intentionally releasing balloons into the atmosphere, and the measure will now be sent to Republican Governor Larry Hogan’s desk.

The bill also requires a person fined with releasing a balloon into the atmosphere to watch an information video or perform community service. The bill was voted out of the House chamber along party lines Thursday. It’s unclear if Hogan will sign the bill.

Many Republican lawmakers strongly questioned the bill. Delegate Sid Saab (R-Anne Arundel County) seemed to be confused about the types of balloons this bill applied to and asked if it applied to balloons you blow into.

“Well you can blow into a balloon, but it wouldn’t go anywhere,” Delegate Regina Boyce (D-Baltimore City) said to the sound of her colleagues chuckling.

Delegate Rick Impallaria (R-Baltimore and Harford counties) recalled his county releasing balloons at his elementary school when he was a child and asked Delegate Regina Boyce (D-Baltimore City) if “this bill would be retroactive and go back and punish government for past errors.”

“No, delegate. You’re safe,” Boyce replied.

“You’re sure?” Impallaria retorted.

“I’m sure,” Boyce replied. “Moving forward, delegate. Not in the past, delegate.”

“Should I feel guilty and criminally responsible?” Impallaria asked.

“No, that’s between you and your maker. You’ll be okay,” Boyce responded. The chamber erupted in laughter and applause. “I promise you’ll be okay.”

“So my children will be better if they never release a balloon into the air as I did when I was a child?” Impallaria asked.

“That’s true, delegate, and let me put it in this context: the releasing [of balloons] is intentional litter. What goes up must come down,” Boyce said.

Boyce recounted the story of the 1.5 million balloons that were released by the United Way in Cleveland, OH in 1986 in an attempt to break the Guinness World Record. On the day of the release, there was a cold front which brought many of the helium-filled balloons back down all over the Ohio region. The release caused numerous car accidents, littered streets and local waterways, shutdown the local airport, and stopped a Coast Guard search on Lake Erie for two fishermen who had gone missing the day before the balloon release. The two men’s bodies washed up on shore two days later.

“So we don’t want any more intentional litter, delegate,” Boyce said.

“Now that sounds like a problem with climate change and not the balloons,” Impallaria said.

“I’m glad you recognize climate change, thank you,” Boyce retorted.

The Balloon Council, a national balloon trade group, supports efforts to prevent balloon releases, but argues that balloon release bans are not the answer.

“It’s really people’s behavior that needs to change,” Lorna O’Hara, the council’s executive director, told WAMU/DCist last year when the balloon bill was first introduced in the Maryland legislature. “Balloons are not the culprit.”

O’Hara said mass balloon releases are not nearly as common as they were in decades past, and she credits education efforts. She said more education is what’s needed now, not a balloon release ban. “It’s a slippery slope from a release ban to banning the product altogether.”

Several other states already have some sort of balloon release ban in place, including Virginia, which prohibits the release of more than 50 balloons within one hour, subject to a fine of up to $5 per balloon.