AUGUSTA (AP) – Testimony drifted into the realm of bedbugs, cockroaches and ants Monday as a legislative committee took up a bill to enlarge the state’s Board of Pesticides Control, a proposal that has put applicators at odds with environmentalists.

The bill before the Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry seeks to add two members to the seven-member pesticides board, which already has two experts in agriculture and forestry pesticides. The new members would include an expert in structural pest management and a business representative.

The bill’s supporters said it’s time to modernize the board by improving its members’ expertise in the changing field. They also see the board, in its present structure, as tilted against pesticide applicators.

“The current Board of Pesticides Control … is neither balanced nor fair,” said the sponsor, Sen. Nancy Sullivan, D-Biddeford, who was joined by the Maine Merchants Association and businesses that provide services to tens of thousands of Maine businesses and homeowners.

Among their opponents are organic farmers and the Toxics Action Center.

Sharon Tisher, who teaches environmental law at the University of Maine, told the committee that the bill is little more than a “pre-emptive strike” by the pesticides industry to weaken controls on pest-fighting products as the board deliberates new rules on indoor applications.

Tisher said she could go along with the legislation if the regulatory panel were renamed “Board of Pesticide Permissiveness,” adding that if it passes Maine should change its motto from “I lead” to “We fall behind.”

Opponents said pesticides board meetings are regularly well-represented by businesses involved in controlling vermin such as tiny bedbugs, which are showing up in schools, hospitals, movie theaters and health clubs in some states and forcing exterminators to take them more seriously.

Pest managers told lawmakers about the importance of having a say on regulations as they face challenges getting rid of German cockroaches, carpenter ants and other kinds of crawling things in an increasingly litigious environment.

Also before the committee Monday was a bill to require the Board of Pesticides Control to undertake a risk assessment for all pesticides used in the state.

Meanwhile, some environmental groups are calling for new rules that would restrict some pesticide applications and expand public oversight opportunities.

The Toxics Action Center and Environment Maine last week submitted petitions to change the rules to ban aerial application of pesticides, prohibit the use of organophosphates, one of the most toxic classes of pesticides, and to waive $20 fees that Maine residents must pay to be on a registry of where and when pesticides are applied in their communities.

The pesticides board could adopt the rules without legislative action.