Did you know that Wilsonville's parks, athletic fields, schools, and Villebois Arbor HOA community is sprayed with TOXIC pesticides?
Setting aside public health considerations, is the City of Wilsonville prepared for the potential financial and legal liabilities related to allowing a known carcinogen to be applied in the city's playgrounds and parks exposing the most at risk population - particularly when this is to be done for purely cosmetic reasons?
In addition to our schools the vast majority of the areas treated with pesticides are used by children, that's why we are asking our school district and Wilsonville’s City leaders to make our children’s health their priority over weed control.
Hazardous exposure can be accumulative and isn’t limited to contact with land: It occurs through air and water, too, as a pesticide application moves off the treated site and spreads in air currents and runoff into neighboring properties and waterways.
During the 2016-2017 reporting year, the City applied: Roundup Pro (Glyphosate), Speed Zone ( Active Ingredient 2,4-D); and Pendulum 2G (Active Ingredient Pendimethalin) just to name a few. -This information was extracted from the Annual Stormwater Permit Report that is submitted to Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.
During the 2017-2018 reporting year, the West Linn- Wilsonville school district applied: Round Up Pro Max (Glyphosate) for weed abatement and Speedzone (Dicamba and 2,4-D) on the turf field as well as landscape grass areas to remove clover.
Villebois Arbor HOA Landscape Company uses Ranger Pro (Active Ingredient Glyphosate) to kill weeds and Wisdom TC Flowable (Active Ingredient Bifenthrin) used for control of the European Crane Fly.
The American Academy of Pediatrics says that there is no safe level of pesticide exposure for children. Pesticides are toxic chemicals - poisons created to kill. They are dangerous for all living things, including adults and pregnant women, and are particularly dangerous for a child’s developing organ systems.
“The major challenge with showing that a chemical causes cancer in humans [as opposed to animals] is that the cancer typically develops many years after exposure.” - Non Toxic Irvine advisor, Dr. Bruce Blumberg, PhD. UCI Professor of Developmental and Cell Biology, and Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences
"By allowing children to be exposed to toxins or chemicals of unknown toxicity, we are unwittingly using our children in a massive experiment," - Non Toxic Irvine advisor, Bruce Lanphear, Professor of Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University, Canada
In March 2015, International Agency for Research on Cancer, a World Health Organization declared that glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp, probably causes cancer in humans. Despite this grave warning, the City of Wilsonville, our School District, and HOA landscaping company continue to spray RoundUp in the places where our children play.
2,4-D is one of the key ingredients in Agent Orange.
Scientific studies show that 2,4-D applied to lawns drift and is tracked indoors where it settles in dust, air, and surfaces and may remain for up to a year in carpets. (Nishioka, M., et al. 1996. “Measuring lawn transport of lawn-applied herbicide acids from turf...” Env Science Technology, 30:3313-3320; Nishioka, M., et al. 2001. “Distribution of 2,4-D in Air and on Surfaces Inside Residences...”Environmental Health Perspectives 109(11).
More conclusive is the proof that 2,4-D falls into a class of compounds called endocrine-disrupting chemicals, compounds that mimic or inhibit the body's hormones. Laboratory studies suggest that 2,4-D can impede the normal action of estrogen, androgen, and most conclusively, thyroid hormones. Dozens of epidemiological, animal, and laboratory studies have shown a link between 2,4-D and thyroid disorders. "That's really important when we're thinking about development," says Kristi Pullen, a staff scientist in NRDC's Health program. "Our thyroid works to ensure the proper timing and development of the brain."
Also alarming, the interactions between the many chemicals being sprayed near our homes and in our parks are unknown. According to David Bellinger, professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, “Impacts from multiple chemicals may simply add up, amplify one another's effects.”
This issue affects every person and pet in Wilsonville. We are asking Wilsonville's City Council, School Board, and Villebois Arbor HOA landscaping company leaders to immediately stop the use of all toxic pesticides and switch to proven and safer landscaping methods. You can find this information on our partners website www.nontoxicIrvine.org
Harvard University, City of Irvine, CA, The Irvine Unified School District all have successfully switched to organic landscaping practices. Other Cities/Counties across the U.S. such as Carlsbad, CA, Portland, ME, Dover, NH and Marin County, CA are banning the use of toxic pesticides and we would like to see Wilsonville join in this endeavor. The City of Irvine has demonstrated you can have beautiful parks, playing fields and lawns that meet community expectations without the use of toxic pesticides.
Please sign this petition to tell the leaders of these organizations that you want them to stop allowing these toxic landscaping practices. It should be a basic human right for a child to play in a park and not be exposed to toxic pesticides. Today there are so many proven and cost-effective options that will not harm our children, pets and our environment.
Here are the health and environmental effects of the 30 most common pesticides.
https://www.beyondpesticides.org/assets/media/documents/Health%20Effects%2030%20Lawn%20Pesticides.pdf
https://www.beyondpesticides.org/assets/media/documents/Health%20Effects%2030%20Lawn%20Pesticides.pdf
For more information, please visit our partner's website – www.nontoxicirvine.org
P.S. Please watch this video, Little Things Matter, to learn how toxins damage the developing brain.
Thanks,
Katie, Kristal, Mary, Simon, Courtney and the rest of us at Non Toxic Wilsonville.
