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http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/10/24/our-daily-poison.aspx
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http://www.beyondtoxics.org/wp-content/uploads/AgentOrange-OregonForest_HipFishMonthly_ALL_FINAL.pdf
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EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt went against his agency’s own research and rejected a ban on chlorpyrifos, a commonly used pesticide that has been shown to damage children’s brain development. The chemical is linked to ADHD, lower IQs and autism.
Certainly some of the most dangerous pesticides like this one should be banned altogether. Another commonly used pesticide in Kern is cancer-causing fumigant 1,3-dichloropropene or Telone. It is banned in the European Union and should be banned here in the United States. Currently, California is the only state that has any limits whatsoever on its use.
It’s clear we won’t be able to rely on federal regulators like the EPA to keep us safe from pesticides – that’s why we must continue to take action at the local level. First on our Kern County to-do list: the buffer zones around schools need to be bigger, as pesticides can drift much farther than a quarter mile.
Second, advanced notification for pesticide application must be longer than 48 hours to give schools, sports teams, and childcare facilities more time to prepare. Some school districts in Santa Cruz and Monterey Counties receive five days warning for fumigant applications within their buffer zones – Kern should follow their lead.
As the late Cesar Chavez said more than 25 years ago, “The misery that pesticides bring farm workers, and the dangers they pose to all consumers, will not be ended with more hearings or studies…the answer lies with you and me. It is with all men and women who share the suffering and yearn with us for a better world.” http://www.southkernsol.org/2017/04/07/op-ed-lets-keep-up-the-momentum-on-pesticide-safety-wins/
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Thus confronted by powerful corporate opposition, the environmental movement has split in two. The older national environmental organizations, in their Washington offices, have taken the soft path of negotiation, compromising with the corporations about how much pollution is acceptable … The people living in the polluted communities have taken the hard path of confrontation … The national organizations deal with the environmental disease by negotiating about the kind of ‘Band-Aid’ to apply to it; the community groups deal with the disease by trying to prevent it. -Barry Commoner: Making Peace With the Planet, 1990
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2-28-1989 At stake are an estimated 300 million to 400 million board-feet of timber–enough to rebuild Burbank–that the Forest Service says it would permit to be cut down in weed-infested areas each year. Herbicides are used in such areas to control weeds that otherwise overrun the tree seedlings that replace felled timber.
At issue is the wisdom and safety of spraying 50 to 75 tons a year of toxic chemicals and suspected carcinogens on the forests–and, critics complain, on the people and wildlife there, as well as on the source of drinking water that eventually pours out of city taps.
“It surprises me some that they want to continue using herbicides in light of what’s come out in the four years they haven’t been spraying,” Glass said. “There have been all these studies documenting links between cancer and 2,4-D and a bunch of the rest of them.” He said spraying hurts not only people and wildlife in Northern California but the water in the area. Nearly 85% of the state’s runoff comes from conifer forests. http://articles.latimes.com/1989-02-28/news/mn-544_1_forest-service
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10-4-16 When planting after harvesting forest, Weyerhaeuser may use herbicides to control weeds, brush and invasive species that compete with tree seedlings for sunlight, nutrients and water, Weyerhaeuser Public Affairs Manager Greg Miller said in an email. http://www.dailyastorian.com/Local_News/20161004/aerial-spraying-rattles-coastal-residents For millions of years nature has been in balance–now many corporations think it is their call as to define how life works, but it is money that motivates them. -r, mt. shasta
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5-31-10 http://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/cnns-look-at-toxic-america/25401
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4-20-12 Loudoun County, VA has announced dates it plans to apply insecticides to local parks to control the tick population. The spraying at the following locations will be on weekdays and end no late than 2:30 p.m.
April 24 – Franklin Park
April 25 – Woodgrove Park, Nell Boone Park
April 26 – Mickie Gordon Park
April 27 – Lucketts Park
April 30 – Claude Moore Park
May 1 – Phil Bolen Park
May 2 – Ashburn Park and Conklin Park
The product being used, Talstar, is Bifenthrin-based and will be delivered using a variety of spray methods depending on the park. The county’s contractor for the project, Blake Landscaping, will post signs at the parks prior to the spraying. Signs also will be posted afterwards stating that the area has just been sprayed.
Lyme disease is caused by bacteria that some people get after being bitten by ticks infected with an organism named Borrelia burgdorferi. The organism that causes Lyme disease is maintained in wild rodents, deer, other mammals and certain ticks. It is transferred to people by the bite of an infected tick.
More information about Lyme disease awareness and prevention is online at http://www.loudoun.gov/lyme.
Comments
Wed, Apr 25 at 10:40 AM by Idiots Buying The Hype | Report this comment
This is not reasonable, will not do anything substantive against ticks and Lyme, and is a complete waste of $20,000 that will kill tons of beneficial bees and other insects. That’s why people are upset.
Wed, Apr 25 at 09:39 AM by leesburgne | Report this comment
Here’s a positive, proactive step by government to protect the public’s health … and people still complain. Why not hold a public protest? Go form an encampment and Occupy Loudoun!! The same crowd complaining about reasonable mitigation efforts for ticks is the same crowd that wants to eliminate mandatory vaccinations for children.
Tue, Apr 24 at 10:13 AM by Very Sad Day | Report this comment
Talstar will kill just about every insect it contacts, bad and good, and is very toxic to aquatic life and not good for anything else. This is like using a nuclear weapon to drive in a nail. A horrible horrible idea. I can’t believe they are going through with this and more people aren’t complaining. Keep your kids and pets out of these parks if you care about their health. This is truly a very sad day in Loudoun County.
Tue, Apr 24 at 09:24 AM by tcb_va | Report this comment
Blake CEO states that there was a bid process (apparently for a retention contract, not specific to this application of Talstar). Nevertheless, Blake is the beneficiary of this direction by the BOS; this smacks of payola.
The BOS should not be telling the PRCS how to manage the parks and this decision should not be made without proper due diligence. The Health Department should be involved in this and they are not.
Tue, Apr 24 at 09:06 AM by Eric the 1/2 troll | Report this comment
I be sure to keep the honeybees at home today. Are we ready for the fishkill in the pond at Franklin Park?
Mon, Apr 23 at 08:52 PM by Politics As Usual | Report this comment
Nobody cares about those questions, just scoring some political points, making Mike Farris happy, and handing out big contracts to campaign donors.
Mon, Apr 23 at 06:45 PM by Does anyone know what’s going on? | Report this comment
How long is this stuff going to be around? How many times are they going to do this, every year, multiple times a year? What percentage of the ticks in Loudoun are they going to kill? Will it even have an impact? How many people have gotten Lymes from one of these parks? Has anyone answered these questions?
Mon, Apr 23 at 04:11 PM by What A Deal | Report this comment
What a deal for the Blake Landscapes CEO – give Scott York and Janet Clarke $319 and get a $20,000 no-bid contract and free advertising in an official Loudoun County new release.
http://www.vpap.org/donors/profile/index/61017
Mon, Apr 23 at 01:08 PM by Recall Clarke | Report this comment
Clarke seems to be involved in every controversy this board is ever involved in.
Mon, Apr 23 at 12:40 PM by beekeeper | Report this comment
Not good. Highly toxic to all of our beneficial insects as well. The honeybees are in enough trouble without this.
Mon, Apr 23 at 11:01 AM by tcb_va | Report this comment
So the BOS capriciously decided to tell the PRCS to spray at a cost of $20,000? No public discussion, no scientific evidence, much less debate, regarding the merits of insecticide application versus the actual potential for contraction of Lyme disease.
Where is the due diligence? Where is the careful and deliberative process of thought before government action? Why wasn’t the Health Department involved?
Now it seems that the sole financial beneficiary of this arbitrary action, Blake Landscaping, was a donor to the the Clarke and York campaigns.
This does not pass the smell test.
Sat, Apr 21 at 09:58 AM by Pandering Politicians | Report this comment
Anything to make Mike Farris happy.
Sat, Apr 21 at 09:37 AM by justsayin | Report this comment
@ Old Patowmac Paddler it is Bles park and how on earth has anyone come up with the “facts” that 2 people have died from tick bites that occurred there?? And this is another reason that actual Lyme sufferers are poo-pooed when people try to spout off information like that!!!
Sat, Apr 21 at 08:54 AM by Elle McGee | Report this comment
HMMMM – in the near past the BOS was so concerned about the affects of chemicals on our water supply that they were going to make it an expensive and difficult process for homeowners to install decks and play equipment in their yards (along with other restrictions).
Now they are going to spray this highly toxic chemical in our parks, close to wetlands,other sensitive areas, and children? It’s very concerning.
Sat, Apr 21 at 06:41 AM by tech9 | Report this comment
Although bifenthrin is the active ingredient in Talstar, it isn’t the only dangerous chemical in the product. The propylene glycol in Talstar has been known to cause kidney and liver damage if ingested repeatedly. It is also known to irritate the eyes and skin as well as kill rainbow trout.
Read more: Dangers of Talstar
Fri, Apr 20 at 09:40 PM by Old Patowmac Paddler | Report this comment
What about Bless Park where two people have died from deer ticks?
Fri, Apr 20 at 06:31 PM by Really? | Report this comment
I’m far more concerned about exposure to excess chemicals that kill things than I am of ticks or lymes disease.
BOS FAIL!
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bifenthrin is a terrible chemical! just sprayed at the mt. shasta public library, again! right next to the public school and wetlands! no warning, no notification, and no need to spray toxins as carpenter ants can be counteracted well by borax. -r
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Roundup and similar products are used around the world on everything from row crops to home gardens. It is Monsanto’s flagship product, and industry-funded research has long found it to be relatively safe. A case in federal court in San Francisco has challenged that conclusion, building on the findings of an international panel that claimed Roundup’s main ingredient might cause cancer.
The court documents included Monsanto’s internal emails and email traffic between the company and federal regulators. The records suggested that Monsanto had ghostwritten research that was later attributed to academics and indicated that a senior official at the Environmental Protection Agency had worked to quash a review of Roundup’s main ingredient, glyphosate, that was to have been conducted by the United States Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roundup-safety-lawsuit.html?_r=1
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