Agriculture Chief Put on Probation

Citing his failure to keep them informed about crucial farmland issues, Ventura County supervisors have placed longtime Agricultural Commissioner Earl McPhail on probation for six months.

McPhail, who is undergoing a performance review for his $84,000-a-year post, also is accused of disappointing supervisors by dragging his feet in seeking disaster-relief funds for displaced farmers and farm workers after December’s freeze.

“He doesn’t communicate at all about what he’s doing on any matter, as far as I’m concerned,” Supervisor Frank Schillo said Thursday. “I don’t know what he’s doing, so why should I reappoint him?”

Supervisors will decide whether to reinstate McPhail, whose latest four-year term expired Jan. 15, after the six-month review concludes July 15. Within that time, the 52-year-old commissioner has been instructed to produce a list of goals he would accomplish during a sixth term.

Supervisor John Flynn also expressed concerns about McPhail’s methods.

“The big issue here is communication,” Flynn said. “You can’t ignore people.”

The supervisors voted during a recent closed session to scrutinize McPhail’s performance.

McPhail, who was appointed commissioner two decades ago, is also under attack by several environmental and pesticide watchdog groups, which are demanding his ouster.

Saying McPhail refuses to communicate with residents and is lax in enforcing anti-pesticide laws, the state and local groups have recently fired off irate letters to supervisors.

“Commissioner McPhail has pooh-poohed community concerns about the health threats posed by these highly toxic chemicals,” said Jonathan Kaplan, toxics program director at the California Public Interest Research Group in San Francisco. “Considering the intensity of the pesticide use in Ventura County, that kind of response is completely unacceptable.”

In August, Kaplan’s group released a report that contended that Ventura County residents risk more exposure to highly toxic airborne pesticides than those in all but two other California counties.

Ventura County ranked behind only suburban Orange and agricultural Fresno counties in a statewide survey of the number of residents living near areas where at least 1,000 pounds of air-contaminant pesticides are applied each year, the study said.

“We need an agricultural commissioner who is not going to look the other way and will proactively seek to minimize the risks posed in Ventura County,” Kaplan said.

McPhail said Thursday that he is working on being more forthcoming with supervisors and residents. But he fiercely denied accusations that he was not properly enforcing state laws pertaining to the toxic gas methyl bromide.

Rather, he said his hands are tied in curtailing the use of methyl bromide, which will be outlawed throughout the state in 2003.

“As long as the pesticides are used properly and legally, the state Department of Pesticide Regulation has determined that there are no health risks,” McPhail said. “They say it’s safe and I have to assume it’s safe.”

Indeed, state pesticide-regulation chief James Wells slammed the report by Kaplan’s group shortly after its release.

“CalPIRG’s latest pronouncement is not a scientific study by any standard, and CalPIRG’s statements about pesticides are clearly meant to frighten, rather than enlighten,” Wells said in August.

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Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau, said because the environmental groups’ hopes for an immediate ban on methyl bromide were not realized, they now seem to be targeting the agricultural commissioner whose job it is to issue pesticide permits.

“Rather than going through the normal regulation process, they are attempting to enforce the law by intimidating the commissioner’s office and intimidating the Board of Supervisors,” Laird said. “The people they need to be talking to is the Department of Pesticide Regulation and the state Legislature. . . . Their ultimate agenda is the outright ban of all pesticides, and whoever gets in the way is acceptable collateral damage.”

In a letter to supervisors, however, Lori Schiraga, a director at the Environmental Defense Center, which has an office in Ventura, cited several incidents during the past few years in which McPhail is accused of neglecting to enforce state and federal pesticide laws.

“EDC doesn’t support the renewal of a contract for anyone who is not doing their jobs,” Schiraga said. “Enforcing policies and regulations of the state is part of his job. Unfortunately, this commissioner has not shown he will take those steps.”

In responding to his critics, McPhail questioned the accuracy of their statements.

“Just because someone says something doesn’t mean it’s true,” he said. “The fact is, those pesticides can be used. If they don’t like the laws, they need to go to Sacramento and get those laws changed.”

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Flynn said McPhail’s primary problem is his reputation of not being accessible to the public.

“He can’t change the law and he can’t cite [farmers] unless it’s warranted,” Flynn said, adding that during the next six months, he wants McPhail to prove he can listen to and educate the community about pesticide use.

Officials at the local chapters of Community and Children’s Advocates Against Pesticide Poisoning, Pesticide Watch, and the California Rural Legal Assistance said they hoped McPhail realizes the importance of becoming a commissioner who will listen to the public.

“We’ve had individual members who have been exposed to pesticides drifting off in the fields and have called Commissioner McPhail’s office,” said Elise Wright of Ventura, an anti-pesticide activist. “The response has been either nonexistent or they’ve gotten the wrong information.”