Precious Dirt

“As crude a weapon as the cave man’s club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life” ~ Rachel Carson

Oh, that life were but filled with happiness and joy. In Oregon our Constitution actually reads the ‘natural rights inherent in people’, ‘instituted for their peace, safety and happiness’. Yet we have discovered challenges to those tenets, practices not well known, yet repeatedly used within our neighborhoods and communities that are anything but related to our peace or safety, and certainly not our happiness.

Imagine 800,000 acres of our forests sprayed with toxic herbicide poisons. That was the case in Oregon in 2005 alone. According to the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s Pesticide Use Reporting System nearly 20 million pounds of pesticides were used in our state in 2008.  Ironically, the last year for reporting this information.* Billions of pounds of toxic chemicals are used annually throughout our country. The numbers are indeed staggering. Here in Oregon many of these toxic poisons are routinely sprayed within our forests, on our highways, on our food, within our neighborhoods, communities, and throughout our state, repeatedly, each and every year.

Unfortunately, many citizens are not aware of these applications. Certainly not to the extent these chemicals are used, nor the potential risks they pose to the health of our air, water, food, land, bodies or future. Any more than citizens are made aware of the specifics of the chemicals themselves. For instance, one of Oregon’s commonly used chemicals is Atrazine. Atrazine was found to be so harmful it was banned (specifically it has been denied regulatory approval ) from use in the European Union in 2003. Yet this toxin continues to be heavily used throughout Oregon, on our food and in our forests and neighborhoods. Nor is it common knowledge that the chemical 2,4-D, once used as a constituent of Agent Orange, continues to be used in neighborhoods and around our children’s schools. These two chemicals are not only routinely sprayed throughout our state, they both have now invaded the bodies of 34 Oregonians, including children. (see Triangle Lake/Hwy 36 Chemical Exposure Investigation) The reality is but a year ago, we too were not aware of the information now available on these pages.

The stark reality we all face is that it is very difficult to even find out the information regarding pesticide use in our state. So much so, that one could conclude they do not want us to know, as in cancelling the PURS program but a year after it started. The ‘system’ is currently designed so that Oregon never has to inform us ahead of time, as to what specific chemicals will be used nor when. There is nothing currently in place that requires Oregon, nor it’s many agencies, designed to “protect” our water, air, land, food and populous to offer advanced warning that toxic chemicals ARE in use. (See Notifications/Subscriptions) At least nothing of any significance.  Nothing is even available to do so, other than the vague and thus meaningless ODF notifications we have to pay for or perhaps the little signs in our parks or playgrounds that offer a “Warning”, assuming our children comprehend them. Nor sadly are there ANY protections for anyone choosing or needing to avoid toxic chemicals, due to health issues.  Let alone, anyone simply not wanting to potentially be exposed, yet being left in the dark.

To quote Rachel Carson “It is ironic to think that man might determine his own future by something so seemingly trivial as the choice of an insect spray”. 50 years after she brought us Silent Spring and the dangers of these poisons to light, and almost 30 years after Carol Van Strum revealed the herbicide nightmare of those living in Oregon’s rural countryside, one could say it is beyond ironic we are still living in such a toxic environment. Or one could say it is rather insidious, perhaps just insane, or BOTH.

From our forests to our agriculture, within our schools, parks, and backyards, to the roads we travel, toxic poisons are STILL inundating our lives. Their use not only prevalent, but growing. This couldn’t be more obvious than in Oregon, even if only taking into consideration the road and highway sprays each year for weed control, or the spraying used in our agriculture, or the helicopters spraying these poisons to ‘protect’ the conifer tree farms of our foresters. Oregonians are bombarded with toxic poisons, at every turn. The killing of weeds and bugs apparently holding more value than the lives of the very people who populate that same landscape.

There are serious questions we feel need answers: Is it at all possible that what Rachel and Carol spoke of is upon us, here in the Illinois Valley? Is it possible there is a serious cumulative effect to these poisons? Is it possible there are health risks also associated with their unknown factors such as their excipients, added to these chemicals so they will ‘stick’.  What of the additives themselves? Is it possible there are risks due to the magnified (synergistic) effects of chemicals in combination, as is often the case, with one chemical, then followed up by another? Last but certainly not least, is it not feasible or understandable that our community and our state should be seriously concerned at this juncture, with the  known risks, readily available science and known associations of these toxic poisons to health issues?  Now that we have become aware of the multitude of known risks, we are confident in our concerns relative to our air, water, fish habitats, animal habitats, our bats, bees, forests, food, our health, the health of our elderly and particularly our concern for our children, for it is in fact their future that we are putting at risk and in jeopardy.  The  answers we have discovered in our research of readily available science, case studies and the long history of these poisons, reveal ALL these issues are not only possible and our concerns are not only valid, but that the continued use of these toxic poisons is beyond alarming. Hence, Precious Dirt.

For those who continue to say we need more science, more studies, more evidence as to the dangers these toxic chemicals pose, that science IS out there and has been for years.  Truth is more and more studies proving the dangers of these toxins to our future are surfacing almost daily.  Also Precious Dirt does not for a minute claim to be experts nor hold degrees in any of the fields relative to this subject matter. Degrees are actually not needed for again the science is prevalent and readily available.  We do however invite and encourage everyone not to simply accept or rely upon what we share on these pages.  Rather do your own homework, research and study of these issues.  We suggest no one takes what we say as fact.  The Truth IS out there, for all who seek.

We do however strive for the peace, safety and happiness afforded all who live within our state via our Constitution.  We simply ask you pursue this important information for in one way or another, toxic chemical poisons affect and effect us ALL.

“It’s always so easy to assume that someone else is taking care of things. People say, we wouldn’t be allowed to use pesticides if they were dangerous. It just isn’t so. Trusting so-called authority is not enough. A sense of personal responsibility is what we desperately need.” — Rachel Carson “The Gentle Storm Center,” Life Magazine, Oct. 12, 1962

* Unfortunately, Oregon chose to stop compiling this information nor make it available beyond 2008,even though PURS first started gathering this data but the year before, 2007.  http://www.oregon.gov/ODA/PEST/purs_index.shtml Go figure !

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Important- Finally, our story has ‘wings’. In a project with the Center for Investigative Reporting Living on Earth’s Ingrid Lobet reports on the practice and the residents who are worried that the chemicals are affecting their health.

http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=12-P13-00018&segmentID=3

Also visit our Facebook page for current insights and campaigns: https://www.facebook.com/pages/PreciousDirtPesticide-Awareness-Coalition-IVCAPS/142914135781373

“If you want to learn about the health of a population, look at the air they breathe, the water they drink, and the places where they live.” —Hippocrates