Methyl Bromide Use Near School

Our children are taught to protect the environment from the time they are in preschool. What child is unaware of the devastation of the rain forest, the destruction of the whale or the radiation from the atomic bomb?

Children are taught they can do something, too: recycle trash, plant a tree. But believe me, they feel helpless and terrified.

What do we as adults do when the environmental poisoning and destruction are happening in our own backyards? What examples are we and our legislators setting for our children?

For example, I invite every concerned citizen to drive down Vineyard Avenue or Rose Avenue in Oxnard all the way to Central Avenue and view a high school enveloped on nearly all sides by miles and miles of plastic. Under that plastic is an extremely hazardous chemical called methyl bromide that can cause damage to the liver and kidneys, heart damage, nerve damage, damage to the respiratory system and even death.

Of course, your legislator will tell you that they haven’t proven the chemical is dangerous in the amounts our citizens are ingesting. They also don’t know what the long-range consequences will be. They didn’t know in the cases of nicotine, lead, asbestos, radiation, etc., etc., etc. either--or so they said.

Methyl bromide is a dangerous poison. We are exposing our children--needlessly. This is happening in our own backyard--not in South America. What are we doing about it? What is our Legislature doing? What are our schools doing?

MARCIA CUMMINGS

Oxnard