Breaking News:

The Monterey Superior Court has ruled in favor of HOPE and ordered CDFA to conduct an EIR prior to any further pesticide spray. Read Brief Summary of Ruling

This is a repeat of Judge Burdick’s ruling in last month’s lawsuit in Santa Cruz.

This is now 2 cases of a superior court ruling that CDFA violated CEQA by creating their false ‘emergency’.

But will A.G. Kawamura admit that he’s been lying to the public? No – he is arrogant enough to go right on lying to the public the moment his agency has been found guilty by the court:

“We are disappointed in the judge’s decision and plan to appeal quickly,” Kawamura said. “The light brown apple moth infestation is, in fact, an emergency that threatens our nation’s food supply and our state’s environment. Eradicating this pest with an aerial pheromone treatment has proven time and time again to be the most effective and safest way to eliminate the need to use conventional pesticides and demonstrate to the nation that California is a leader in environmentally sound eradication projects.”

Sorry, A.G., but the court has just ruled that there is no emergency.

Vegan Reader offers heartiest congratulations to HOPE, David Dilworth and the people of Monterey County on this court ruling!

And now, we’ve got to keep working, harder than ever, to demand that any safety tests be conducted by independent third parties – not liars and lawbreakers like CDFA.
———

UPDATE: From David Dilworth of Hope:
HOPE: We Win Again … That’s “Check.”

Spraying Stopped Over Monterey

Today Judge Robert O’Farrell ruled HOPE was right;
that CDFA violated the law when they aerially sprayed untested,
secret pesticides on our cities and children and wildlife.
He ordered California’s Agriculture Secretary A.G. Kawamura,
to stop spraying until CDFA completes an Environmental
Impact Report.

HOPE attorney Alexander Henson said “I’m glad that
this case will set a precedent requiring government
to do the required studies before they spray an
unsuspecting populace with untested chemicals.”

CDFA told the Judge Thursday they expect the
EIR completion in January. Since the state seems
to delay spraying from January until June, this
should give Health and environment advocates
another year to get laws passed to permanently
halt aerial spraying and to force CDFA to use
non-aerial spraying non-toxic solutions such
as the Targeted use of Sticky Traps.
(1hope.org/nonspray.htm)

So — Our Skies are Safe for another year.

Waaaaaaahooooooooooo CUBED !!!!!!!

HOPE Trustee Terrence Zito said “HOPE has been
saying since last August that spraying people with secret,
untested, unwanted pesticides is immoral and illegal. The
courts have now twice confirmed that CDFA acted illegally.”

“This is the second time in 2 weeks a court has convicted
A.G. Kawamura, California Agriculture Secretary, of violating
California’s a biggest environmental law, our California
Environmental Quality Act (CEQA)” added David Dilworth,
Helping Our Peninsula’s Environment’s Executive Director

HOPE believes that at least 14 other laws were broken in
pursuit of eradicating this trivial moth.

For more info – www.1hope.org/checkmate

For more info on CEQA – www.1hope.org/ceqa.htm

Donations Appreciated and Still Needed –

HOPE Trustees and staff deeply appreciate the
many, many (tax-deductible) donations given to
help our suit.

(We still need to raise another $3,700 to break even.
If you can afford $500 or just $5, please get out your
checkbook while you are reading this. You can send it to –
“HOPE, Box 1495, Carmel, 93921″
Thank you.)

If you feel so inspired – We still must raise
thousands of dollars to prepare for our next steps.

To help by Donating for our suit to protect
our Monterey Peninsula please see –

www.1hope.org/donate.htm

HOPE is planning to add to its methodical, successful efforts.

Dilworth said “I am sorry to report that because CDFA so
willfully violated the law and took advantage of the delay it
took HOPE’s suit to get to the Judge, HOPE fully expects
CDFA to prepare a slapdash EIR, just so they can get started
spraying.

Then when we get the EIR rejected by a court in 2010,
CDFA will have accomplished another season of
illegally spraying us and our cities with untested pesticides.

Because of this HOPE is considering filing a placeholder
suit on the EIR’s inadequacies now, even though the EIR
is not complete, so that CDFA will not be able to spray
us while we wait 10 months to have our EIR suit heard.

If the EIR arrives, and HOPE finds it adequate (I’m
not holding my breath … for adequacy), we can drop
our suit at that time.

We also plan to ask the courts to apply this ruling statewide,
so the San Francisco area will not be sprayed this Fall;
AND — HOPE is taking other steps that we HOPE
will stop any spraying of people – forever.

When we accomplish that . . .

That … would be a real “Checkmate.”