Spray Foes Would Make Exceptions the Rule

Orange County anti-malathion activists said Tuesday that they will flood officials with exemption applications in an admittedly tongue-in-cheek campaign to halt the next round of Mediterranean fruit fly spraying.

Bob Taylor and Molly Haines, leaders of Orange County Citizens Against Malathion Spraying, said the group is soliciting residents in the spray zone to send in dozens of exemption applications citing everything from outdoor barbecues to canine birthday parties.

The action is in response to an exemption granted to the Crystal Cathedral during Medfly spraying on Jan. 25.

Helicopter pilots subpoenaed by attorneys for the city of Huntington Beach said in depositions that the state ordered them to cease spraying while flying over the landmark cathedral in Garden Grove. The exemption was granted after Crystal Cathedral officials complained that malathion spraying would disrupt an outdoor dinner for 2,700 ministers gathered for a conference.

“What if, in that mile-square area (where the cathedral is located), there were a few fertile Medflies?” Taylor asked at a press conference Tuesday in the County Hall of Administration in Santa Ana. “Does that mean the 70,000 residents in the spray area were sprayed needlessly?”

Taylor and Haines also questioned boundary lines drawn by the state to define spraying areas, which exclude Disneyland and other popular tourist attractions.

They also dismissed the reason for Crystal Cathedral’s exemption as invalid, noting that a religious education seminar attended by about 3,000 participants at the Anaheim Convention Center was sprayed that same evening, even though organizers of the seminar had asked the Garden Grove City Council to seek a postponement of the spraying.

“We think that whatever credibility there was for the state of emergency was certainly lost by this (exemption) action,” Taylor said.

To point out what they called the “capricious and arbitrary” nature of the cathedral exemption, Taylor, Haines and other members of Orange County Citizens Against Malathion Spraying fanned out across the 36-square-mile spray area Tuesday to distribute leaflets entitled “Application for Exemption from Aerial Malathion Spraying.”

Residents were asked to fill out the forms and send them to Henry Voss, director of the state Department of Food and Agriculture.

The forms read:

“Whereas the exemption from spraying extended to the Crystal Cathedral on the 25th of January provides a precedent for similar exemptions, and whereas Mr. Rex Magee, associate director of the Department of Food and Agriculture stated to the Los Angeles Times, February 10, 1990: . . . ‘It is a matter of common sense and politeness (when members of the public are going to be outdoors) not to spray . . . people with that sticky bait stuff,’ . . . therefore I respectfully request that my property be exempted from aerial spraying. . . . “

The leaflet includes a space in which to cite reasons for the exemption. Haines said reasons sent in so far include a woman’s celebration of her husband’s promotion with a back-yard party, and another resident’s outdoor birthday party for a dog.

“Obviously, our campaign is partially tongue-in-cheek, but we think this is a very serious matter,” Taylor said. “There are very serious health effects turning up all over our district.”

Taylor cited a recent Times poll in which 20% of residents in spray zones said they had felt some ill effects after their neighborhoods were doused with malathion.

Department of Food and Agriculture spokeswoman Gera Curry said that “there will be no more exemptions of any sort--I can say that unequivocally.”