Patty Clary, Californians for Alternatives to Toxics
A bill advancing through the California legislature on a tide that could carry it to the governor’s desk, AB99 would bring all of California the opportunity to enjoy what residents of Humboldt and Mendocino Counties have experienced for thirty-four years, often without realizing they have it: Highways free of thousands of pounds of toxic herbicides that were once used to kill weeds where today, mowing and other vegetation management have taken their place.
AB99 has survived review by three committees in the Assembly where moderates frequently torpedo environmental bills. It is now headed to a floor vote where there’s a good chance AB99 will pass and be taken up for consideration in the state Senate.
Under AB99, Caltrans would be required to develop a statewide policy of integrated pest management (IPM) using a variety of scientifically developed methods to manage roadside vegetation as the agency has promised for years it would do. This IPM policy, with little or no herbicide, would be required on state highways in counties where restrictions or bans regulate the counties’ own use of the chemicals. Advance public notification of spray sites would be required under the law and a detailed report on Caltrans’ herbicides released to the public each year.
Last year the total amount of herbicide used by Caltrans was 420,000 pounds in 53 counties. In thirty -four years since Caltrans stopped using herbicides in Humboldt and Mendocino, the agency has sprayed twelve to fifteen million pounds of herbicide throughout the state, touching on every California county that’s not in a desert – or Humboldt and Mendocino – a practice that got its start in the early 1960s and grew rapidly thereafter.
Herbicide spraying on Humboldt and Mendocino state highways was halted by Caltrans in 1989 in response to a lawsuit threatened under California’s Environmental Quality Act by locally-based anti-pesticide groups following a decade of opposition to the chemicals. A later attempted return to herbicides met with intense public resistance supported by elected officials of Humboldt and Mendocino counties and several cities to continue Caltrans’ no-spray policy while tribes chose to ban the chemicals outright from their lands.
The successful three-plus decades of no-spray vegetation management on 730 miles of state highways in Humboldt and Mendocino counties provide a solid basis for development of a Caltrans’ IPM policy. Several other counties have chosen to regulate their use of herbicides and are ready for a Caltrans IPM policy while others will soon join the movement.