Features

On Wednesday afternoon the State Assembly’s Agriculture Committee heard four bills and one resolution concerning the State’s plan to eradicate the light brown apple moth (LBAM) by aerial-spraying the Bay Area and Central Coast counties with a pesticide called CheckMate.  

Hundreds of residents of Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties reported various illnesses and negative health symptoms immediately following the aerial spraying of those counties last fall. The state plans to resume spraying Monterey and Santa Cruz counties in June and to begin spraying the Bay Area counties Aug. 1. 

Concerned Californians from all over the Bay Area, as well as from Monterey and Santa Cruz counties, packed the AG Committee hearing room to voice their opposition to the spray plan and to express their support for the legislation before the Agriculture Committee. When Chairwoman Parra invited members of the public to voice their support for one or all of the bills related to the LBAM spray plan, approximately 250 people stepped up to the microphone to state their names, home town and support for the bills. Many added a plea to the committee member: “Please don’t spray us.”  

Although several were members of environmental or health advocacy organizations, the majority seemed to be individuals motivated by concern about their health and that of their families. There were many mothers with small children, working people who had taken the day off to make the trip to Sacramento, and elderly citizens including one 91-year-old woman, people with asthma and people with chemical sensitivities. It took half an hour for the committee to hear the public comment with the speakers rotating among three microphones. 

Opposition to two of the bills was presented by representatives of the Western Growers Association, the California Grape and Fruit Tree League, the California Chamber of Commerce, the Wine Institute, the California League of Fruit Processors, the California Agriculture Council and the California Association of Wine Grape Growers. 

Assemblymember Laird (D, Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties), in presenting his proposed legislation, said that his office had received more public input on the LBAM spray plan than on any other issue in his legislative career.  

The bills that passed were AB 2763 (Laird) and AB 2765 (Huffman). AB 2763 requires early planning for responses to invasive plant and insect species. Potential pest control treatments would be disclosed well ahead of time and subjected to greater scrutiny than they now receive. AB 2765, which requires full disclosure of pesticide ingredients, examination of alternatives to aerial spraying, and a public health assessment of the risks of aerial spraying, passed, but does not require disclosure of the formulation of the pesticide. These bills now head to the Assembly Appropriations Committee. Neither of them was opposed by the agriculture industry. 

ACR 117 (Laird) also passed. This resolution calls on the state to address the unresolved health, scientific, and efficacy issues concerning the 2007 light brown apple moth eradication effort. 

According to Laird’s spokesperson, “Whether any of these efforts will succeed in derailing the feds’ trade-agreement-driven plan to spray for the moth this summer in Santa Cruz, Monterey and the Bay Area counties remains to be seen.” 

The bills that would have required the State to consider public input before aerial spraying, opposed by the agriculture industry, failed to pass out of committee, despite Chairwoman Parra’s declaration that “We have to bring the people to the table” on the LBAM issue. AB 2764 (Hancock) would have prohibited aerial spraying of urban areas without a governor-declared state of emergency. The current eradication program only needs approval by CDFA staff who are not directly responsible to the voters. The purpose of AB 2764 was to increase accountability by making the highest elected official in the state directly responsible to the population being sprayed, but the opposition prevailed by convincing the committee that this would amount to politicizing an issue best handled by appointed officials. 

AB 2892 (Swanson) would have required the State to obtain the approval of a community to be sprayed through the electoral process before conducting aerial spraying of pesticides over an urban area.  

The Swanson bill, AB 2892, generated the most controversy. Assemblymember Berryhill predicted that if the light brown apple moth gets into the Central Valley, it would be “Armageddon” for California agriculture. Assemblymember Swanson made the point that there are other methods that might be just as effective as aerial spraying, and potentially less harmful to human health, but they have been rejected as too expensive. He predicted that his constituents will not consent to four or five years of being sprayed, that people will insist on being heard when it comes to protecting the lives of their children. Swanson insisted that the people to be affected directly by the spray must be brought to the table on the issue.  

One of the proponents of the Swanson bill was a man named Mike De Lay, an insurance agent from Pacific Grove on the Monterey Peninsula. De Lay is a Republican and a self-described conservative who does not normally challenge the government. But both he and his wife, an asthmatic, were made sick by the spray, and she had to leave the area for several months. Delay shared pictures drawn by children in Monterey County depicting their fears of being sprayed again. 

Swanson summed up by declaring “The debate will not stop here regardless of the vote.” 

For more information about the State’s position on the LBAM program, see www.cdfa.ca.gov/phpps/PDEP/lbam/lbam_main.html. For information from groups opposed to the spray see www.stopthespray.org/ and www.lbamspray.com/.