Date: Sat, 25 Mar 2000 17:32:40 -0500
From: Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Lyndon Hawkins <hawkins@empm.cdpr.ca.gov>
Senior Research
Scientist
State of California,
Department of Pesticide Regulation Integrated Pest
Management
Dear Lyndon, I thought you might like to
read an e-mail I just received from Dr. Janette Sherman
-
Toxdocjs@aol.com who forwarded the
following:
Subject:
Giuliani Begins Poison Spraying Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2000 15:20:27 EST From:
ARTISTpres@aol.com To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Giuliani Begins Poison Spraying by Robert
Lederman
Earlier today [3/24/2000] I was driving on
Ocean Parkway in Brooklyn. My car windows were wide open because it was an
unusually warm and beautiful day. This exceptionally wide tree-lined highway
with its hundreds of park benches is filled on such a day with hundreds of
senior citizens, infants with their baby-sitters, dogwalkers and joggers. I
began to smell an unusual odor which reminded me of mothballs. Almost
immediately my neck and shoulders began to ache, I experienced some muscle
weakness and dizziness and felt a strange sensation in my lungs and nasal
passages.
At first I thought my allergies were
kicking in early this year. The strange sensations became stronger as I
proceeded South. Suddenly I
spotted a green Parks Department vehicle slowly driving along the traffic
island that runs for miles along the parkway. A man wearing a respirator was
spraying a liquid greenish-yellow substance from the truck covering most of
the traffic island which is about 12 feet wide. I sped ahead of the truck,
parked on a side street and ran over to take some photos. The driver was also
wearing a respirator. He hid his face as I approached and refused to tell me
what they were spraying but did hand me a card with three phone numbers.
I saw no warning signs posted. Numerous
adults and children were on the section of traffic island I saw being sprayed.
Because of the large dispersion of the spray swath and the fairly strong
breeze, the substance was airborne across all of Ocean Parkway which is one of
the City’s widest streets. I began smelling the chemical at least a mile
before I saw the truck.
I called Mr. Thomas Stofka, Director of
Forestry (718) 768-0224 whose number was on the card. Mr. Stofka gave me the
following information. The chemical being used is Pendimenthalin. There are
two formulations being used. Their commercial names are “Pre-M”
manufactured by Lesco Inc. and Pendulum, manufactured by American Cyanamid.
Mr. Stofka claimed the purpose of the spraying was, “to reduce weeds which
are not only unsightly but harbor rodents and insects”, and to make NY a,
“safer and more attractive City”. He
stated that the chemicals are, “only slightly toxic”, but that applicators
are required to wear long sleeve shirts, boots, goggles and a dust mask type
of respirator.
Mr. Stofka was very helpful and faxed me
both products safety data sheets. The sheet on Pendulum states: “Caution!
Keep out of reach of children. Avoid contact with eyes, skin or clothing. Do
not ingest. Avoid breathing sprays or mists”.
A fact sheet on Pendmenthalin can be found at:
http://pmep.cce.cornell.edu/profiles/extoxnet/metiram-propoxur/pendimethalin-ext.html
Where the following is quoted from: “TOXICOLOGICAL EFFECTS ACUTE TOXICITY -
Pendimethalin is slightly toxic if ingested, inhaled or absorbed through the
skin. The most probable occasion for human exposure is to applicators during
mixing, loading, spraying and flagging (5). Pendimethalin is a mild skin
irritant (6). When applied to the eyes of rabbits, pendimethalin caused
irritation of the cornea which cleared within 7 days. Inhalation of dusts or
fumes may be mildly to moderately irritating to the linings of the mouth,
nose, throat and lungs (2). The amount of a chemical that is lethal to
one-half (50%) of experimental animals fed the material is referred to as its
acute oral lethal dose fifty, or LD50. The oral LD50 for technical
pendimethalin in rats is greater than 5000 mg/kg (6). The dermal LD50 for
technical pendimethalin in rabbits is greater than 2000 mg/kg. The lethal
concentration fifty, or LC50, is that concentration of a chemical in air or
water that kills half of the experimental animals exposed to it for a set time
period. The inhalation 4-hour LC50 for technical pendimethalin in rats is 320
mg/l and for Prowl 4EC is 3.5 mg/l (6, 2). “
Note that when the EPA calls a chemical
“safe” ("registers" an active POISON ingredient) what they
generally mean is quite different from what the average person means by that
word. For them "safe" often means that 100 rats could be exposed to
the chemical and only 50 will die, not that (the POISON) it is harmless (or
"safe"). (It is against
the federal law ti state even the labeled use of any "registered"
POISON is "safe!)
I later found a nearby playground
literally covered in the same greenish yellow substance. A sign warned that a
pesticide and rodenticide had been used that same day and advised caution. The
playground was filled with small children most of whom were under five years
old.
Last week Parks Commissioner Henry Stern,
who the 3/19 Sunday NY Times called, “The Clown Prince of the Emerald
Kingdom” and who is well-known as Mayor Giuliani’s most slavishly loyal
underling, held a number of urgent press conferences. Mr. Stern was outraged
that someone had let their dog attack the raccoons in Central Park. Mr. Stern
said that the NYPD and Parks police would do whatever it took to bring the
criminal to justice.
I’ve always been an animal lover, and I
particularly like raccoons. However, isn’t it interesting that the Giuliani
administration is up in arms about a few raccoons being harmed yet is once
again indiscriminately spraying toxic chemicals (POISONS) on the (ENTIRE ANIMAL
AND) human population of New York? This time it’s not even for a supposed
emergency situation but in order to, “make NY a more attractive place”. It
seems to me that raccoon safety has a much higher priority for the Mayor and
Henry Stern than does the safety of the City’s human population.
Why is it that with 40,000 WEP workers
being forced to do slave labor by the Giuliani administration the City can’t
put that immense work force to the task of safely eliminating unsightly weeds
in Parks using hand tools rather than spraying us all with toxic chemicals?
Why are the people of New York City considered expendable by this Mayor?
Mr. Stofka pointed out to me that the more
dangerous chemical, Pendulum, was only being used in my part of the City and
was part of a leftover batch from last year. For all my fellow Jewish
residents of the largest Jewish neighborhood in NY who raised so much money
for Mayor Giuliani’s campaigns and voted for him so loyally, please take
note. They chose to spray the more dangerous and toxic chemical in our
neighborhood on a street lined with synagogues, yeshivas and playing children.
Did the Mayor or Bruce Teitelbaum, his Dathan* to the Jewish people, call and
warn you not to let your kids play in this chemical filth? Did they ask you to
close your windows on this unseasonably hot Sabbath day so as to avoid
breathing the toxic fumes? Did they alert you not to track it into your homes
after walking back from tonight’s services?
The CDC and the media are whipping the
public into a panic about West Nile Virus in preparation for another round of
organophosphate nerve gas spraying, if not something worse.
Of course, they claim that spraying will be a last resort.
The City has still refused to release the
name of a single person who allegedly died of West Nile Virus. Their privacy
is being protected despite the public and medical professionals urgently
needing to know this information yet Patrick Dorismond’s sealed juvenile
records are broadcast to the world by the Mayor despite no one needing to know
this information. The Mayor claims privacy rights end after death. In that
case Mr. Giuliani, immediately release the names of every alleged victim of
West Nile Virus and the results of their autopsies. Don’t hold your breath
waiting for the results as they will never be released, because it’s quite
possible that no one died in NYC last year due to West Nile Virus.
Let the Eugenics experiment continue.
Thanks Mayor Mengele, and have a frothy glass of Malathion on me!
*Dathan was the character in the Ten
Commandments portrayed by Edward G. Robinson who urged the Jews fleeingEgypt
to return to slavery under Pharoah.
Mayor Giuliani's press office 212 788-2958
Parks Dept. 212 360-1315
Robert Lederman is an artist, a regular
columnist for the Greenwich Village Gazette [See: http://www.gvny.com/ for an
extensive archive of Lederman columns] The Shadow, The Vigo-Examiner [see:http://www.vigo-examiner.com/archive.htm]
and Street News, and is the author of hundreds of published essays concerning
Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. His essays and letters have appeared in the NY Times,
NY Post, Daily News, Newsday, Brooklyn Bridge, Park Slope Courier, The Daily
Challenge, Amsterdam News, Sandbox, Penthouse, Our Town, NY Press and are
available on hundreds of websites around the world. Lederman has been falsely
arrested 41 times to date for his anti-Giuliani activities and has never been
convicted of any of the charges. He is best known for creating hundreds of
paintings of Mayor Giuliani as a Hitler like dictator.
Robert Lederman, President of A.R.T.I.S.T.
(Artists’ Response To Illegal State Tactics) ARTISTpres@aol.com (718) 743-3722 http://www.openair.org/alerts/artist/nyc.html
Also see: http://www.levymultimedia.com/lederman/index.htm for Lederman’s
essays on Malathion and the spraying of insecticides on NYC [scroll down the
menu to the items highlighted in blue].
Well Lyndon, it seems you have some
company, another beLIEver in the "safety" and/or
"necessity" of using
your "registered" POISONS. I
suggest that you all begin to think before you act/POISON - you will find that
people in a free society do not take it lightly when their employees totally
ignore common sense and routinely and/or needlessly POISON them! It is amazing
that other "politicians" gassed the Jews with organophosphates in
Nazi Germany! Now
"others" apparently feel free do it again!
Hoo-ha! What a chutzpanik!
To tell us your "registered" POISONS are "safe" or that
your "registered" POISONS are "protecting" us, is like a
man who shouts "HELP! HELP!" as he beats you to death!
Respectfully, Stephen L. Tvedten
Please!
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