Epa Asked To Review State’s Pesticide Enforcement
Environmentalists have asked a federal agency to review Washington’s pesticide enforcement authority in the wake of incidents in which hunters claimed they were sprayed by an herbicide.
Letters sent to Chuck Clarke, Environmental Protection Agency regional administrator, and Jim Jesernig, state Department of Agriculture director, also seek a formal review of the South Columbia Basin Irrigation District’s pesticide program, as well as a random sampling of records of other irrigation districts.
An Oregon helicopter company sprayed the herbicide 2,4-D along the South Columbia Basin district’s canals to control weeds on Nov. 2-3, 1996. Later, seven people hunting in the area - near the Columbia River in south-central Washington - complained of health effects and said they had been hit by spray drift.
The environmental coalition, led by the Washington Environmental Council and the Bullitt Foundation in Seattle, contends the incidents show the state is not living up to its obligations to the federal agency.
The state Agriculture Department enforces regulation of federally licensed pesticides.
“It is abundantly clear that WSDA’s pesticide enforcement program does not meet its obligations under EPA’s delegation to an agency of the state of Washington,” the group wrote Tuesday in a letter to Clarke. “The department fails to exercise any effective enforcement.”
Calls Wednesday to the EPA office in Seattle and the irrigation district offices in Pasco were not answered.
In its letter to Jesernig, the coalition complained that sanctions against the irrigation district and the helicopter company that applied the herbicide last fall were “mild.”
“WSDA’s light-handed approach to pesticide enforcement provides no effective deterrent to this kind of conduct,” the letter said.
Agriculture officials - who originally deferred to the federal agency to conduct an investigation into the alleged spray incidents - said state law limits what actions the department can take.
The EPA currently is reviewing state enforcement programs it funds, as well as the Agriculture Department, said Bob Arrington, the department’s assistant director for pesticide management.
If the EPA review, expected shortly after the first of the year, concludes there is a conflict, the agency will go to the Legislature and the governor to seek changes, he said.
The EPA fined Precision Helicopter of Newberg, Ore., which had a spray contract with the irrigation district, $1,500 for using chemical concentrations greater than allowed and spraying where people were present.
The Agriculture Department pulled the applicator license of the Precision pilot for failing to keep accurate records and twice reprimanded an irrigation district employee for authorizing improper concentrations of 2,4-D and failing to adequately warn people in the spray area.
Investigations by the Federal Aviation Administration and EPA did not find that hunters were directly sprayed, but concluded people were present in or near the spray area.
Three of the hunters have filed lawsuits against Precision Helicopters, claiming the chemical spray injured their health. Two of them also filed suits against the irrigation district, which oversaw the spraying.
Since the spraying incidents, the irrigation district has suspended aerial pesticide applications.