Here is a letter I received from Don’t Spray California today, which I’m reprinting here:

Santa Cruz County won a delay in court, until a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR), as required by the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), is completed. While we applaud Judge Burdick’s recognition that the CDFA has not shown the LBAM to warrant an emergency exemption from the CEQA process, according to Santa Cruz County Public Information Officer Dinah Phillips, this decision is about aerial spraying. In fact Santa Cruz Council Ron Garcia clarified that this law suit specifies the aerial spraying of “pheromones”. To be clear, this does not specify any other aerial spraying, nor does it cover ground applications. As Mr. Garcia said about the legal world, “the devil is in the details”.

The court ruling is also specific to Santa Cruz County, and other than setting precedent, has no bearing on the CDFA’s plans for Monterey County and the San Francisco Bay Area. Shortly after the court ruling, however, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger released a statement to the press that aerial spraying is postponed in all areas targeted for LBAM eradication, until a series of minimal tests, which test only for acute, not long term effects, are completed on the chemical formulations under consideration for the spraying. The tests are to be conducted by agencies who have already demonstrated their bias in refusing to communicate directly with any of the hundreds of people who were injured by the spraying last Fall (http://gov.ca.gov/press-release/9419/).

According to the press release, aerial applications are rescheduled to continue in Santa Cruz and Monterey beginning August 17, and a spokesman for the governor told CBS 5 that aerial spraying in the Bay Area may be delayed until October.

Secretary A.G. Kawamura promised that the CDFA will appeal the Santa Cruz court’s decision immediately, and United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Spokesman Larry Hawkins indicated that they will wait to see what happens with the State’s appeal, before deciding if Federal officials will step in and continue spraying anyway (http://www.pe.com/ap_news/California/CA_Moth_Spraying_338538C.shtml).

When we called the governor’s office in San Francisco, we were told by a representative that “the eradication still has to happen” and that “pending aerial treatments with hot spots [of LBAM finds], the USDA can trump us” and overrule the State’s decisions. She also reiterated that the ruling just affects aerial spraying, and that “ground treatments are going to continue at this point”.

Ground applications are continuing indeed, are in fact being expanded to Santa Barbara, with Sonoma pending for quarantine, which would result in pesticide applications there as well. Entire neighborhoods have already been hosed down with Btk, a pesticide which lacks proper study, and is implicated in gastro-intestinal illnesses and damage to the immune system (http://eastbaypesticidealert.org/No%20Spray%20Zone%20paper%20on%20Btk.PDF). Twist ties are going up, often in easy reach of children and pets, and which contain some of the same untested chemicals as the ones that were sprayed by the planes, which even the manufacturer’s Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) admits are “harmful if absorbed through skin” (http://www.pacificbiocontrol.com/Light%20Brown%20Apple%20Moth%20-%20LBAM_files/MSDS-LBAM.pdf). There are also plans to apply the same chemicals, mixed with permethrin, a neurotoxic, carcinogenic, endocrine disrupting, chromosome-damaging insecticide, on a minimum of 3,000 utility poles and trees per square mile, just overhead of passers-by, and in easy reach of climbing children and other curious critters (http://www.mindfully.org/Pesticide/Permethrin.htm). More toxicology of all methods used by the CDFA is on our website (www.DontSprayCalifornia.org) under “Light Brown Apple Moth”.

It is urgent that municipalities and public agencies oppose more than just the aerial spraying but the CDFA’s eradication program as a whole. Not only are pesticide applications toxic, but the LBAM is not the threat the CDFA claims it to be, and drastic eradication measures should not even be open for discussion.

There’s much documentation testifying to this, especially relevant the report from Dr. Daniel Harder and Jeff Rosendale, two exotic plant experts, who researched the USDA and CDFA claims of damage in New Zealand. They found that the reports of damage are from a time in which pesticides were used against the LBAM, which also eliminated the moth’s natural predators, and caused resistance in LBAM and other pests. Once the pesticide program stopped, the ecosystem became more balanced again, and the LBAM has not been a significant pest since. The CDFA’s pesticide plan is precisely what not to do, will in fact only cause their own predictions to come true.
(http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a27/pdf/HarderNZReportFINAL.pdf)

With all the media focus on aerial spraying, most people remain unaware that this program involves anything more, but the great majority of people we’ve informed about the ground applications, do not feel represented by this narrow focus, and are concerned about this program’s impacts on their health and safety.

The Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission is currently recommending “that the Berkeley City Council oppose the entire pesticide program to eradicate the Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM), whether by aerial spraying, ground spraying, twist ties, permethrin, or other related methods”. An East Bay Regional Park District Board’s resolution started out focusing only on aerial spraying, but was amended, upon finding out details of the ground applications, to oppose the chemical program (http://eastbaypesticidealert.org/LBAM,%20EBRPD%20Board%20resolution.doc). The district’s workers, AFSCME Local 2428, passed a very strong resolution opposing the entire program in defense of the health and safety of workers, park visitors, and the environment, calling for the USDA to downgrade the pest classification of the LBAM to reflect the lack of risk it poses (http://eastbaypesticidealert.org/AFSCME%202428%20resolution.doc).

The Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission also recommends that the city “take legal action across regional borders for a strong united front with all affected municipalities opposed to the program”. We urge municipalities once more to join in united legal action against the CDFA pesticide program in its entirety, and defend everyone affected against this toxic assault. Contact information for most of the representatives of the areas to be pesticided can be found here: http://forum.stopthespray.org/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=360

For activists, the best case for joint actions and a united front comes from the USDA’s own Emergency Manual itself, which states that one of several conditions under which an emergency program can be terminated is when “Sociopolitical opposition prevents emergency action” (page 91) (http://www.lbamspray.com/00_USDA/EmergencyProgramsManual%20.pdf ).

What are we going to do? Let’s put our heads together and make some plans!

Don’t Spray California/East Bay Pesticide Alert
http://www.dontspraycalifornia.org