If you live in Lanark County an email from you could make a difference. What: Vote by Mississippi Mills Council on a motion to start spraying this year FOR THE FIRST TIME the municipal roadsides with pesticides to control wild parsnip and other noxious weeds When: Tuesday, February 6, 2018, starting at 6:00 p.m. Where: Municipal Council Chambers, 3131 Old Perth Road, K0A 1A0, just outside the town of Almonte Who: Anyone concerned about the negative environmental impacts of pesticide use in Lanark County Why: To show MM Council there is sizable public opposition to this motion How: Send an email to MM Council, explaining your concerns to our councillors, care of the Clerk: sstone@mississippimills.ca. Attend the meeting if possible. All you have to do is to send an email to the councillers through this one simple email address. sstone@mississippimills.ca. If you can send it ASAP it gives the clerk time to circulate it and for the councillors to read it before Tuesday. You can cut and paste the following or include some of these points in your letter. Dear Mayor and councillors, I ask you not to support roadside spraying for the following reasons: We are in a pollinator crisis now, bees are stressed and the monarch butterfly is now on the endangered list. Herbicide use has been shown to negatively affect pollinators. Clearview is a selective herbicide that kills all broadleaf plants, including milkweed. Rural children who live near farms are already exposed to too many pesticides. There is new evidence linking pesticide exposure to endocrine disruption. Clearview was never tested as a mixture of its ingredients, nor has it been tested with the adjuvant called Gateway Clearview could possibly contaminate wells because one its main ingredients called aminopyralid moves easily through shallow soil. Spraying the strips of roadsides will not affect the population of wild parsnip because it has a huge seedbank in other areas. Education is what will keep us safer from wild parsnip, One solution could be to allow money for extra mowing where there is a complaint or problem As a taxpayer I ask that money be better spent on education, well timed mowing and manual removal methods Thank you so much for your time and public service. Sincerely,