Tompkins County Board Passes Pesticide Notification Law
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Date:
Wed, 18 Dec 2002
07:58:13-0500
From:
Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Paul Helliker <phelliker@cdpr.ca.gov>
Director, State of California, Department of Pesticide
Regulation
cc: Christine Whitman whitman.christine@epa.gov
Wednesday, December 18, 2002 -- Tompkins County Board passes pesticide notification law By DAN HIGGINS - Journal Staff.
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ITHACA -- Tompkins County residents will know much more about how their neighbors are treating their lawns next summer.
In an 8-7 vote, the County Board of Representatives voted Tuesday to enact a Neighbor Notification Law for Pesticides, following months of intense lobbying by people on both sides of the issue.
"I did have concerns about the law ... but I think its benefits outweigh the negative aspects, including an educational value to teach people about pesticides," said Rep. Peter Penniman, D-Ulysses and Enfield, in a statement which was echoed by many of the law's supporters.
About a half-dozen members of the public backing the law spoke at the beginning of the meeting. They said the law is a common sense tool for people concerned about their health to know what their neighbors are introducing into the environment.
Christine Cox of Cayuga Heights said the possible link between pesticides and cancer is reason enough to force companies to notify those nearby of what they are about to use.
Opponents said the legislation puts too much of a burden on chemical applicators, and on the Tompkins County Health Department, which will have to enforce the law.
Ken Miller, a Tioga County resident who owns farmland in Dryden, said he does not object to notifying neighbors about pesticides. But the law, he said, is unreasonable, in that it's time consuming, costly and difficult to enforce.
"Why pass a bad law?" he said. "Why not put into place a voluntary system, and give it a try for a year or two?"
Like many lawn care industry lobbyists, Miller preferred a voluntary registry, where people would have to place their names on a list if they wanted to be notified about pesticide use in their neighborhood.
Groups like the New York State Public Interest Research Group, as well as the Attorney General's office, said that a voluntary registry would be null and void. The state law said counties could only consider the pesticide law as signed by the governor two years ago, and not devise legislation of their own.
The law will require commercial applicators to notify their customers' adjacent neighbors 48 hours before they spray chemical pesticides. The written notice can include two rain dates. The county's Health Department will be in charge of enforcement, and not complying can result in as much as a $10,000 fine for commercial applicators.
Homeowners who apply spray pesticides on large areas of their lawns won't have to provide written notice, but will be required to place a sign on their lawns to notify their neighbors. Homeowners face fines of $100 for a first offense, and $250 for every new offense.
Rep. Frank Proto, R-Caroline and Danby, said he voted no in part because he resented the county putting into law what he always considered the etiquette of the neighborhood.
If a farmer in his rural enclave of Slaterville sprays something that drifts into his yard, "I knock on the door the next day and ask if he'll make sure the wind is blowing the other way the next time," he said.
"That's what we do in Slaterville. I don't know what you do in Cayuga Heights, but I think this law is overkill."
The law has plenty of exceptions. Farmers, for example, are exempted from any agricultural use of sprayed pesticides. Granular pesticides, boric acid, and horticultural oils are also exempt.
John Knudsen, who runs a lawn-care business in Albany County, said the law has already caused him to pass higher costs onto his customers.
He also insisted that chemicals recently removed from store shelves like Durizban, was not only low risk, but safer than coffee or aspirin.
It would take 375 regular "doses" of the pesticide as it was used to be fatal, he reasoned, where the caffeine equivalent of just 100 cups of coffee is toxic.
In other business, the County Finance Director David Squires told the Board that he estimates the county will receive in excess of $2 million more in sales tax revenue than was anticipated for 2002. The County budgeted $20,500,000 in sales tax for use in the 2002 budget.
Squires said the County had gained that amount by the end of November.
http://www.theithacajournal.com/news/stories/20021218/topstories/596717.html
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