Councilwoman Wants City to Be Notified of Spraying : Pesticide: A weekend aerial application of malathion was legal, but the Moorpark official says people need to know if it is used near homes.

A helicopter spread malathion onto an onion field in Moorpark over the weekend, prompting a city councilwoman to urge that the city be notified of aerial spraying of pesticides. A low-flying helicopter hired by Boskovich Farms on Sunday sprayed 18 acres of onions in the city.

Agricultural officials said the spraying was legal. But City Councilwoman Eloise Brown said she wants the city to be notified whenever the spraying threatens to expose Moorpark neighborhoods to chemical pesticides.

“I’d like to know when they’re spraying malathion,” Brown said. She noted that there are homes next to the field that was sprayed and that residents could have been exposed without knowing it.

About 40 acres of city-owned farmland is leased to Boskovich Farms, City Manager Steve Kueny said.

The city plans to use the land for a park, he said.

Aerial spraying is not restricted under the lease, but officials prefer that sprays be applied from the ground, Kueny said.

Malathion is being used in parts of Southern California against the Mediterranean fruit fly, which hasn’t made inroads into Ventura County.

It is not considered toxic by state and county agricultural officials.

However, the aerial spraying has prompted protests in some neighborhoods in Los Angeles.

Boskovich was spraying for a pinhead-sized bug called a thrip, said Dave Clarke, a pesticide control adviser for Boskovich.

The pest attacks onion leaves and eventually kills the crop, he said.

Clarke said Boskovich has used malathion once before on the field without attracting complaints.

“Chances were that if it weren’t malathion, we wouldn’t have had any repercussions at all,” Clarke said.

The sale of malathion isn’t restricted, and growers do not have to inform the county of their intention to spray with it.

About 1,558 pounds of malathion is sprayed each year on Ventura County fields, some of which are located near homes, said Dave Buettner, the Ventura County deputy agricultural commissioner.

“Malathion is not a real hazard, particularly if it’s applied properly,” Buettner said.

“We’re never going to get away from that exposure potential when we live with agriculture and residential side by side,” he said.

The spray used on Boskovich’s fields was more concentrated than that being used against the Medfly, Buettner added.