Advertise Here

Deliver your message to thousands of readers every day.

Our readers are influential opinion makers - politicians, journalists and activists.

Learn more about ads.

Our latest headlines

Want more? Dive into the archives.

About Us

David Greenwald, Editor. (Contact David.)
CFC Education Foundation, Publisher. (Contact us.)

Got a news tip? Want to write a guest column?
Contact David here.

About California Progress Report.

Founded by Frank D. Russo (Publisher and Editor, 2006-08).

Books

Mothra: Why the Schwarzenegger Administration is Wrong About Spraying Californians With Toxic Chemicals

By Robert Lieber, RN
Mayor
City of Albany

In a May 16 article on his department’s plan to eradicate the light brown apple moth (LBAM) by aerial spray and other means, California Agriculture Secretary A.G. Kawamura accuses those who oppose the LBAM program of spreading “misinformation” and urges us all to rely on “sound science” and to “draw the line” on “exaggerated and unsubstantiated claims” that cause “unwarranted fear.”

Mr. Secretary, it is time to look in the mirror. You and your department are the primary source of misinformation and fear tactics.

You claim the pesticides you sprayed last fall and want to spray this summer over our communities are “just pheromones,” neglecting to mention that the products in question are designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as pesticides and contain not only untested, synthetic pheromones but a host of other toxic ingredients, dispersed in minute plastic capsules.

You claim that LBAM is a “ravenous” pest that will destroy California agriculture and eat everything from redwoods to Scotch broom when in fact this benign moth has caused no damage in California and almost no damage in the other states and countries where it is established.

You claim that the spray is safe and has been tested when your own department’s documents say otherwise. You claim that the state’s superficial review of the 643 illness reports after last year’s spray proves there is no link between the spray and the sicknesses when in fact that report reviewed only 10 percent of the reports and concluded it could not determine whether or not there was a link.

Who is relying on unsound science and unsubstantiated and exaggerated claims?

At least two courts in the state of California have agreed during the past month that your science is not sound, halting the spray program in Monterey and Santa Cruz counties and ruling that you and your department abused your discretion in exempting the program from any environmental review.

Local governments all around the Central Coast and Bay Area where spraying is slated to start this summer also agree that your claims do not stand up to scrutiny. Almost every city and county – more than 25 at last count -- where you and your department have made presentations about the LBAM program has now voted to officially oppose the program.

You say you choose to rely on facts. So let’s look at some facts.

Your own publications contradict your claims that the spray is safe. You say it is untrue that the pesticide used last fall has not been tested. In fact, the assessment published by the California Departments of Health and Pesticide Regulation and the California EPA’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment clearly says the active ingredient in those pesticides, a synthetic moth pheromone, has never been tested for human exposure. The “thorough review” that you claim those agencies gave the pesticide relied on short-term exposure data for other pheromones, assumed they would be applied only over unpopulated agricultural areas rather than the populous urban areas that will be affected by the LBAM spray, and ignored the other ingredients that made up more than 80% of the pesticide. Those other ingredients include carcinogens, mutagens, and chemicals associated with birth defects and miscarriages, and toxic to aquatic life. Your department repeatedly claims it is “unaware” of those health risks even though they are documented in the toxicology database of the United States’ Institute for Occupational Health and Safety and on Material Safety Data Sheets prepared by the chemical manufacturers.

Now you are touting the “six-pack” toxicology tests being done on the pesticides proposed to be sprayed over our communities this summer. But you fail to mention that these are short-term exposure tests that determine how much of a pesticide or individual ingredient will be fatal to an animal in a very short period of time. These tests will tell us nothing about the actual risks faced by human populations to ongoing exposure from a pesticide that time-releases during the 30-day periods between sprays or about the risks of long-term health problems such as cancer.

At a recent presentation in the Central Valley where CDFA is now trying to shore up its case for spraying Bay Area and Central Coast residents, a farmer who had researched the moth and found it is not a threat asked: “why are you bringing alarm into the Central Valley?”

The only fear being spread is by CDFA, claiming that LBAM is a “voracious” pest that will eat “anything green,” destroy California agriculture, and overrun the Central Valley. You have produced no science, substantial or otherwise, to support these claims. In fact, your own department has said the moth has done no damage to crops or plants in California. Respected scientists have shown that LBAM is just another of the many leaf-roller moths that do no harm in California and that it does almost no damage in other countries and states where it is established and which do little or nothing to control it. The USDA’s own research shows that LBAM will not reproduce in the extreme temperatures of the Central Valley.

For months you told us that the reason there was no crop damage due to LBAM was that it had just arrived last year. But on a recent radio show you admitted that it has been here at least 6 or 7 years. Meanwhile, entomologists across the UC system have been saying all along that it has been here 10-50 years. How many other claims have you made that will be revised when the moth of mass destruction turns out to be just another mild-mannered leaf roller? And, meanwhile, how many more people will have to get sick before your sham science and unsubstantiated denials crumble and the truth is revealed that the LBAM program is dangerous and unnecessary?

We have read a lot in the news recently about interference with the work of government scientists charged with evaluating the safety of chemicals to protect public health. A Government Accountability Office report found that the White House's and other agencies had “delayed or blocked efforts by the Environmental Protection Agency to list chemicals as carcinogens,” (San Francisco Chronicle, Apr. 30) and that the U.S. EPA has bypassed the results of its own scientists research to instead rely on recommendations of an industry-funded group. Rules changes by the Bush Administration have made deliberations about chemical risk secret so that there is no oversight or open scientific debate. An April 30 Washington Post article notes that this “makes it impossible to see whether agencies are acting in the interest of science or for less noble reasons.” It seems clear similar problems have trickled down to CDFA as you and your staff present cherry picked and misrepresented science to the citizens of California in an effort to rationalize a dangerous program for which there is no justification.

You claim that you are conducting the LBAM program “in an open, transparent manner.” In fact, East Bay residents have for some time been requesting CDFA’s schedule of LBAM presentations and asking that those presentations be balanced to include the scientists whose research counters the state’s unsubstantiated claims. Those residents have received no response.

With all these lies, omissions, abuses of discretion, and failures in transparency to your credit, Mr. Secretary, and with the burden that has been placed on the independent scientists and citizens of California to bring the facts about the LBAM spray to light, the charge of misrepresentation clearly lands at your own doorstep.

Posted on May 20, 2008

Comments

Bravo!!! I wish this solid, truthful article could be read by millions and will be sure to send it to every elected official I can, as well as other thought leaders and influencers, and web masters of public interest sites. I hope others who read this will please send the link far and wide. The Governor and his staff need to read this, too, because it explains how the CDFA, OEHHA and other state agencies have eroded public trust in his administration and severely tarnished his legacy as Governor.

Posted by: Mike Lynberg at May 20, 2008 07:52 AM

Bravo! Excellent article, Mr. Lieber. Let's keep them coming. We have to continue to fight back against the lies of the CDFA, which, please remember, are totally supported and undisputed by Schwarzenegger.

Facts that need to be given more publicity in this fight are:

1) The moth cannot survive in hot climates like the central valley. It prefers coastal temps from 40 to 86 degrees.
2) As of 5/9/08, per the CDFA Situation reports, there are now 61% more moths in Santa Cruz than prior to spraying on 11/1/07. It doesn't even work and has been proven to not be an "eradication" tool as the CDFA claims.
3) We, in Santa Cruz, supposedly the center of infestation, still cannot find any damage from the moth.
4) Farm workers cannot be sprayed with any pesticides in the fields.
5) Eight brown pelicans, an endangered species, were killed by the spray. Who's responsible for that?

It's obvious that no matter how much scientific evidence, proof of sickness to people, death of animals, harm to bees, is presented to the CDFA, they will steam-roll this plan forward to get the Federal money! Facts will not stop this program. We need other political measures generated by the people.

Posted by: Jerilyn Bock at May 20, 2008 10:01 AM

Mr. Lieber,
Thank you for your truthful article and, most importantly, for your environmental activism in stopping the LBAM Project.

The LBAM Project (chemicals) has been a wake up call to what is happening on a much larger scale. Unfortunately, our larger reality is that our state and federal governments, both elected officials and bureaucrats, are lobbyists for the elite interests of corporations, businesses, and the wealthy. This is the reality behind the LBAM Project - the financial trade interests of agriculture over and above everything else, which includes the health of all living things and our environment.

Our larger reality is that the financial motivations of people is killing us, our planet, and all living things through pollution and global warming. The LBAM Project (chemicals) is just another example of our living nightmare that continues to unfold. Will it be too late for all of us to wake up in order to save ourselves and future generations from our living nightmare so we can save our only home - Earth?

Already, many communities in the Western United States are experiencing water shortages from global warming from pollution. Much of this energy problem could have been solved years ago with sound energy policies, but again, the financial oil interests prevailed from stopping that from happening.

Our greatest challenge of all time is for all of us to become environmental activists, now and for future generations, in order to save our planet, humanity, and all living things from the environmental damages people are doing to the Earth.

We can not let financial interests trump the health of our environmental goals. The LBAM Project (chemicals) is a small example of the bigger picture that must be stopped.

All of us need to push back on our anti-environmental government lobbyists for ourselves, our children, for humanity, and for our home, Earth.

Posted by: bpm at May 20, 2008 05:53 PM

Great article! Really puts the fear mongering in perspective.

I just got a response from Governor Schwarzenegger to a letter I sent him, and I plan to scan it and post it to my blog tomorrow. He said the LBAM poses a "great threat" to our environment and agricultural regions of the US, but, offers no proof whatsoever. "California must combat this invasive threat before it crosses borders into other states, agricultural regions and environments", he said. (It seems we have forgotten that cows and carrots and most of the other cash crops of the central valley are essentially "invasive" species like this enemy combatant moth.)

He says he is confident the "six-pack" of toxicology tests will "reassure Californians that we are taking the safest, most progressive approach to ridding our state of this very real threat to our agriculture, environment and economy."

I don't care about getting a sore throat or itchy eyes. I care about what happens to my kids after several years of playing in the parks, playgrounds, and backyards that get showered with this. I guess the real test will be on us - like DDT and malathion. Remember those solutions were supposed to be good for us too, to protect us from those evil terrorist bugs...

Posted by: kevinkrejci at May 20, 2008 11:28 PM

Mayor Robert Lieber, RN appears to commit the same crime as the Bushies – that regardless of the science, the decision is made based on political or special interests. Mayor Lieber accuses CDFA of “cherry picking”, but at least their cherries have a scientific, statutory, and policy foundation, where his appear product of LBAM “Stop-the-Spray” informational meetings, and catching the State in misstatements.

The policies that established LBAM as a significant pest weren’t cooked up yesterday. Review of scientific (and peer reviewed) studies indicate this to be one of many “A” insect pests that has been on CDFA and USDA’s “bad bug” list for a while. And if LBAM had been here 30-50 years it would be distributed statewide - consider how fast it appeared in new territories just this past year - Sonoma, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles.

Mayor Lieber’s holding up “never having been tested for human exposure” as the pesticide safety standard seems a red-herring as no one is going to advocate human testing – even FDA approved products don’t - there are ways to test pesticide safety without human testing. This has been made up to be a health issue though local public health officers and the States Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment haven’t found any links between reported health effects and aerial treatments. Never the less, there is something sinister about planes flying overhead at night, spraying - even if the product is a non-toxic organic approved pheromone with inert ingredients found in cosmetics. After the fiasco of the med fly eradication projects of the eighties and nineties, even med fly treatment programs are ground based, and the state would be wise to develop a ground based plan “B” for LBAM should the aerial treatments themselves remain grounded.

(note - contrary to urban myth and a couple dissenting scientists, med fly has been eradicated from California, but it finds its way back thru Hawaii vacationers with smuggled fruit)

My fear is that urbanization of the State and politicizing of invasive species eradication programs will ultimately result in the degradation and eventual loss of California’s native ecosystems. As more invasive species are introduced by the wayfaring public, and houses and development paves over habitat, California’s predominant flora and fauna will be squawfish, bullfrogs, codling moth, and French broom. There are invasive species exclusion programs (Hwy 80 / Truckee Plant and Pest Inspection Station) but these have been cut to where they are as porous as a sieve. If the public doesn’t want eradication projects, they should be asking for restoration of pest exclusion programs.

Posted by: Fred Crowder at May 23, 2008 05:29 PM

Cut the abusive relationship with Schwarzenegger's "financial interests" family. Recall Schwarzenegger. End the deception, lying, and determination to bully and force the people of California to "just tolerate" endless pesticide campaigns. Grey Davis was recalled to set-up Schwarzenegger. Turn about is fair play. The Exterminator has drawn the line and he stands with the moneyed few, not the people of California.

Posted by: jan at May 26, 2008 08:43 AM

What a load of crap!!!!

Posted by: Jim Finan at July 1, 2008 10:47 AM

What a load of crap!!!!

Posted by: Jim Finan at July 1, 2008 10:47 AM

GO APPLE MOTHS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: jtfinan at August 4, 2008 12:30 PM

Get Email Updates

Want the California Progress Report by email? Once a week, we'll send you the latest and greatest headlines.

Stat tracker