Jacob Sandoval speaks about a state pesticide proposal at a news conference in Watsonville in November. (Ruby Lee Schembari — Santa Cruz Local file)
Hearings on proposed pesticide rules
The California Department of Pesticide Regulation will present details of a pesticide proposal and accept public comments at two more hearings this month.
- 6-8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 16 at the National Steinbeck Center, 1 Main St., Salinas.
- 5:45 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 21 at the Chico Women’s Club, 592 E. 3rd St., Chico.
- Comments also will be accepted until Jan. 24 in an online form or by email at [email protected].
WATSONVILLE >> Based on research from the California Environmental Protection Agency, state regulators have proposed a lower daily exposure limit of the likely cancer-causing pesticide 1,3-dichloropropene for farmworkers. The proposal wouldn’t change that threshold for schoolchildren and residents near pesticide applications, who can legally be exposed to 14 times that limit.
Now, pesticide activists are urging state regulators to adopt the stricter exposure limit for everyone — or ban the pesticide as 40 nations have.
“While much of the world is banning 1,3-D, California is going in the wrong direction,” wrote Yanely Martinez, an organizer for Californians for Pesticide Reform and Safe Ag Safe Schools, in a statement. “Our regulators must follow health protective science, but DPR’s policies ignore the science in favor of protecting Dow Chemical’s profits. They should be protecting our health,” Martinez wrote. “This is a racist policy,”
This month, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation started a public hearings on the proposed regulation for farmworkers at a Jan. 8 event in Visalia and a Jan. 10 online hearing.
Victor Torres, a member of the Watsonville-based youth organization Future Leaders for Change, said he went to school for years near fields with pesticides. At age 10, he suffered a severe asthma attack that sent him to the emergency room. He eventually got a report that said which pesticides had been applied near his school that day.
“From a list of 10 pesticides that day, one pesticide in particular that showed up on that list of concern — and still of concern today — is 1,3-D,” Torres said. “Our communities are not worth 14 times less. It is shameful that these high levels of exposure are still allowed to continue.”
Melissa Dennis, a third grade teacher at Ohlone Elementary School in Royal Oaks, said the air monitoring station at the school has repeatedly measured an unsafe level of 1,3-D.
“I’ve taught at Ohlone for 15 years. In that time, I have had three students with cancer in my class,” she said at the hearing. “All three of those students are still in special ed. One student was left blind when her tumor was removed from her brain.”
After the public comment period closes Jan. 24, state regulators will “review and respond to all comments received, and consider revisions to the proposed regulation,” said Ann Schaffner, environmental program manager for the Department of Pesticide Regulation.
Residents can weigh in on an online form, by email at [email protected], or at an in-person hearing:
- 6-8 p.m. Jan. 16 at the National Steinbeck Center, 1 Main St., Salinas.
- 5:45 p.m. Jan. 21 at the Chico Women’s Club, 592 E. 3rd St., Chico.
Read more
- Pesticide use near schools detailed in Santa Cruz County – April 26, 2024
- Watsonville mayor joins fight against pesticides near schools – June 3, 2024
- Students protest pesticide proposal in Watsonville – Nov. 1, 2023
- Pesticide use near schools prompts calls for more transparency – Jan. 28, 2022
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Nik Altenberg is a copy editor and fact checker at Santa Cruz Local. Altenberg grew up in Santa Cruz and holds a bachelor’s degree in Latin American and Latinx Studies from UC Santa Cruz.
