The City of Miami Beach ("CMB") is using glyphosate, a toxic chemical, to kill weeds on city property. Let's urge the CMB to stop using glyphosate (and other toxic weed killers). Ban glyphosate sales and application by everyone. Please share this petition with your friends and family.

What glyphosate usage means to you:

Are you or your friend's toddler crawling in the toxic herbicide residue, just hours or days after the latest glyphosate spraying? (See pics below!) Maybe they sat in an area soaked in glyphosate from an application the day before. Maybe you sat in the shade on a cleared area under a tree, covered in glyphosate. (See pics!) What about your dogs? We walk in glyphosate, and track it into our homes. And it ends up in our bodies, harming us.

Here are a ton of facts about how glyphosate is harmful to people and the environment:

Toxic to people

• "...it is unequivocal that exposure to glyphosate produces important alterations in the structure and function of the nervous system of humans, rodents, fish, and invertebrates." (International Journal of Molecular Sciences, April 21, 2022)
• In March 2015, the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified glyphosate as "probably carcinogenic in humans". (Wikipedia, multiple studies cited)
• "In 2017, the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) classified glyphosate as causing serious eye damage and as toxic to aquatic life..." (Wikipedia cited ECHA)
• "Workers exposed to glyphosate were about twice as likely to get B cell lymphoma." (Wikipedia cited Schinasi L, Leon ME (April 2014). "Non-Hodgkin lymphoma and occupational exposure to agricultural pesticide chemical groups and active ingredients: a systematic review and meta-analysis". International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health)
• There is an "excess of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder among children born to glyphosate appliers...." (Wikipedia)
• "In June 2020 Bayer agreed to a $10 billion settlement as a result of a number of class-action lawsuits alleging that Roundup had caused cancer." (Wikipedia cited The New York Times.)

Toxic to Biscayne Bay and our waterways

• "....glyphosate, Roundup's main component, is classed as "dangerous for the environment" and "toxic for aquatic organisms" by the European Union." (Wikipedia)
• "At sub-lethal concentrations, exposure to POEA or glyphosate/POEA formulations have been associated with delayed development, accelerated development, reduced size at metamorphosis, developmental malformations of the tail, mouth, eye and head, histological indications of intersex and symptoms of oxidative stress.[135] Glyphosate-based formulations can cause oxidative stress in bullfrog tadpoles.[15] (Wikipedia)
• Does glyphosate break down quickly? NO: "A site in Iowa had a half-life of 141.9 days." 
  (Wikipedia, Giesy JP, Dobson S, Solomon KR (2000). "Ecotoxicological risk assessment for Roundup® herbicide".)
• After our region's frequent heavy rains, glyphosate runoff flows into our waterways, kills fish and aquatic life. Dead fish stink up Biscayne Bay.

Can you believe that tons of this poison is being sprayed all around us, every year? Let's stop this poisoning now!

How is glyphosate being used in CMB? 

See attached pics. The CMB directs the contractor Everglades Environmental Care, Inc. ("EECI") to spray glyphosate anywhere and everywhere they think a plant shouldn't grow:

• at the base of trees and bushes in parks
• along the cracks in sidewalks
• around playgrounds
• on and next to basketball and tennis courts
• ...EVERYWHERE where the city and landscapers think that grass or weeds shouldn't grow.

EECI is spraying "Prosecutor Pro" by Lesco. The label shows it is 41% Glyphosate, 59% other ingredients.

So how can CMB allow glyphosate usage if there is so much evidence of its danger, and if a large number of the world's agencies and governments say glyphosate is toxic (as mentioned above)? Because somehow, the US EPA has ruled it "probably" doesn't cause cancer. Smells fishy...

 

Here are solutions. Yes, we like pretty parks in our city. We can have them, without poisoning ourselves. It just took a quick Google search to find lots of solutions. Here are several:

• https://www.nontoxiccommunities.com/cities.html
• https://theconversation.com/controlling-weeds-on-playing-fields-parks-and-lawns-without-herbicides-103819
• https://www.pesticide-free-towns.info/methods-techniques
• https://today.uconn.edu/2019/07/controlling-weeds-playing-fields-parks-lawns-without-herbicides/
• https://www.almanac.com/video/keep-weeds-under-control-without-weed-killers

P.S.: You might be thinking, meh, they're just spraying in areas where no one really goes. But have you seen most of our parks after our famous downpours? Where there is standing water across the grass, across the sidewalks and streets? Yep, the chemicals spread everywhere, and down the drains into our bay and ocean.