Arcata Is on Cutting Edge of Nontoxic Pest Control

Health worries are prompting a growing number of communities to move away from using traditional pesticides on public property. Arcata has gone one better and simply banned them.

From street medians to the ballpark of the wildly popular semipro Humboldt Crabs, the pest control policy for this progressive North Coast community goes beyond environmentally friendly to downright chummy: No chemical warfare and, when possible, pests will be moved, not massacred.

“If we can displace them to another locale that doesn’t cause us a problem, then we haven’t interrupted the food chain or the natural balance. That’s the ideal situation,” says Steve Tyler, Arcata’s director of environmental services.

People on both sides of the pesticide issue agree that Arcata is at the tip of a trend.

“The public is starting to realize that these chemicals are not benign substances and they’re particularly hazardous to children,” said Greg Small, executive director of Pesticide Watch in San Francisco.

“We are concerned, certainly, that activist groups are able to persuade school boards and municipal boards to take their draconian actions based on fear and hyperbole, not based on reasonable science,” countered Allen James, executive director of RISE (Responsible Industry for a Sound Environment) in Washington, D.C., which represents urban pesticide manufacturers and distributors.

Other public bodies are reducing pesticide use as well:

* The Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest, is phasing out traditional pesticides and turning to patching cracks, pulling weeds and steam-cleaning areas where pests breed.

* In San Francisco, officials can use only a limited list of traditional pesticides and are turning the food chain to their advantage, bringing in cockroach-eating geckos and gopher-eating snakes.

* In Buffalo, N.Y., the Pesticide Sunset Ordinance passed last September commits to ending the use of virtually all pesticides.

Much of the activity has focused on schools. The Beyond Pesticides/National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides found that more than 140 school districts have restricted or regulated pesticide use on school property.

RISE supports trying nontoxic pest control first, but James thinks governments are making a mistake when they rule out traditional pesticides altogether. “To ban pesticides and rely totally on other approaches inevitably fails,” Jameshe said.

Taming toxins sometimes means using nature to fight nature.

In San Francisco, not only were geckos brought into the Conservatory of Flowers to snack on flower-munching cockroaches, but predatory wasps are running a sting operation on sap-sucking insects.

In Buffalo, officials plan a grub-scouting party this August in which hundreds of volunteers will comb a municipal golf course for signs of grass-destroying pests.

The Arcata ban is unusually strict. Where other cities allow use of traditional chemicals as a last resort, Arcata does so only when health ordinances come into play--say, when roaches turn up in the city-run senior citizens’ lunchroom.

A curious mix of loggers and liberals plunked in the middle of redwood country about 300 miles north of San Francisco, Arcata has been looking for alternatives to poisoning its pests for years.

Its policy didn’t become official until February, when the measure was passed by the city council. Green Party members have held the majority there since 1996, another first.

One of the biggest challenges for the new methods was showing residents they could maintain the hallowed ballfield without poisons. They’ve been largely successful, using tarpaulins to cover the infield dirt, mowing and reseeding frequently and keeping garbage cans washed.

In other parts of town, landscapers have sealed cracks, cleaned streets and used plants that thrive in the foggy coastal climate, making them less vulnerable to pests.

Trap-and-release is the preferred control for four-footed infiltrators.

“You can’t tolerate rats in your kitchen, but it doesn’t necessarily mean you have to trap and kill,” Tyler said. The question is, “How do we keep them in their area . . . and out of our area?”

The ban doesn’t apply to private property, although hardware store manager Paul Wilsonsays, “We have a lot of people that check the labels real close.”

Others aren’t quite ready to make the switch.

“We sell our fair share of Roundup,” he said.