Recommendation to amend the City's pest/weed management policy to eliminate the use of products or materials that contain glyphosate(s), including weed abatement sprays such as "Roundup" and "Ranger Pro." Direct City Manager to seek alternative organic products for weed and pest abatement for use by City staff in parks, medians and other areas.
I'm an I motion case. ET tu. Kate. Next item is 26. Item 26 is a communication from Council Member Tauranga case membership in the case of the Mango encampment Austin recommendation to amend the city's pest wait management policy to eliminate the use weird abatement sprays such as Roundup and Ranger Pro. Thank you. Customer. Thank you. Mayor On March 28th in 2017, the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment personally noticed that with glyphosate about pronouncing it right would be added to the list of carcinogens known to the state of California to cause cancer per Proposition 65. On August 10th, 2018, a state court in San Francisco ruled that Monsanto Products Roundup and Ranger Pro were not adequately labeled to detail potential negative health impacts. I want to thank my colleagues for standing up to this very important item. I also want to thank out of them with the director of the Parks Recreation Marine Department for his leadership on this item from the moment that I brought it up to him. There is a lot of research that supports the city's efforts to stop using products containing glyphosate, including the popular Weed Killers Roundup and Ranger Pro. I'm pleased to see the recent memo from the city manager and a24 from memo from Mr. Mullet that highlights the immediate halt of using these products in our parks. I think it's time to have a conversation about establishing a way to stop the use of this very carcinogenic product across our city. Reducing our community's exposure to these types of products that contain carcinogens is important and something I'm sure many of my colleagues will support. I would like to amend my motion to request a report back from the city manager in 90 days to explore alternatives to glyphosate. Liberal seat products and the costs associated with its implementation. And I want to thank you. Councilwoman, go. I would like to thank the park advocates that have worked on this with me over the last 6 to 8 months, and that I only offer some additional opportunities and discussions for consideration with Parks and Rec director. Perhaps we don't need to mow every week and that in an alternative we would be able to use some of that savings for the elimination of pesticides and then perhaps supplement some of the. Why could I keep thinking the word pond is pond. Pond swims pond. I call it a marsh swims pond maintenance that is so detrimental he needed. There are so many areas in the parks and rec system that need additional maintenance. And so if we could no less than perhaps that would be an opportunity to beef up a lot of the other areas. I mean, I think that the people that really know where those areas are are the people that are boots on the ground every day in our parks. And I know that most of our team works on a daily basis with Harley, and so I look forward to working with him and hearing his recommendations. Thank you. Any public comment on this item? Hi cluelessly. Here I am, the Secretary of Carp and I'm a President of the East Side Voice and most recently a member of a group that is forming called the Friends of Eldorado Park East. A couple of months ago, a small group of residents got together to look at the deteriorating conditions in Eldorado Park. The section north of spring. We contacted the fifth District Council. Office, and we got a very positive response from Councilwoman Mongo. She had already conceived of an idea to form groups at each park, to create a partnership with those that want to be involved and to monitor the parks. We want to thank Councilwoman Mango for providing the opportunity for us to be part of the solution. The top two issues in our list and our list was about three pages long, was inadequate watering, which I think you pretty much dealt with tonight in the budget and the unhealthy foliage, grass, trees and ponds, very possibly a result of the prolonged use of poisons for weed abatement to keep the grass from growing where it was not wanted and to keep the weeds down. And what we see them doing is loading up the truck with Roundup and then driving down the road and and hosing it along the road edges and also around the trees. And it's pretty excessive use of poison. And this is a big issue with the environmentalists. We want to thank our new parks director for immediately getting engaged on this, as well as our mayor for boldly stepping up and suggesting that we could have a ban on glass effect across our city. But I know that to make that happen requires members of our council to get involved. And in the spirit of being part of the solution, we could possibly get rid of all herbicides. If we do that, what's the downside? The kids have to play on grass with a few dandelions. You know, there is there is a little bit of milkweed that perhaps the butterflies could feed on. And I'm a big fan of industrial engineering. And if you really feel that there's going to be a problem here with cost, I would suggest that we do as a time study. Does it really take more money and longer to use a weed whacker or to spread mulch along the roadway? If we need to cut labor in the contract and it's based on a time study, can we change the most schedule which Councilwoman Mango just brought up? Can we go from every week to perhaps two times a month? Grass cut short gets sunburned and the water evaporates faster than it would with longer grass. I think the kids will be happier to play on longer grass with a few dandelions. Thank you. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Kerry Sharp. And again, I want to also thank the council. People of four council members had also put this ahead of the agenda tonight. Also to thank Mr. Mongeau for jumping on board on this right away and supporting the removal of Roundup from our parks. It's such a great start too, but I also want to make sure that we urge to complete them the whole city wide ban, because I agree with Councilwoman Price. I think our media and say a lot about how we look also and when we're killing the grass with Roundup on our medians, it's turning into dirt. And I have to tell you, looked a little bit the other day, I was following one of the mowers on the median off of Bellflower, and it looked a little bit like pig pen from from Snoopy because there was nothing but a bunch of dirt behind the mower. And I don't know, I thought it was kind of funny. But it also does go to show that we are doing something to our grasses that are wrong, which is, of course the roundup. Also most of Monsanto's lawsuits. And of course, we know that they have them. And Monsanto's lawsuits are because of prior knowledge. And we have to keep that in mind that now we have prior knowledge of what this stuff does. It's out there, it's on the news every single day. And we have to do something about it to make sure that we are addressing the fact that we could also be held culpable if we already have prior knowledge. And you also have to know that Monsanto didn't just send a couple of people to progressive fight this precedent setting judicial issue. They sent their A-Team. They sent a lot of lawyers to make sure to fight this down. And they still lost. They were still found culpable to the tune of $289 million. And one of the biggest problems with Roundup and I'll be really quick, is that it was it's a wind carrying chemical. So when you think that you're only spraying one tiny little spot, it actually can get airborne and it can waft on to other and other surfaces and stick to them. And if a child touches a tree that we didn't think we were spraying and ends up with that on their hands, that's a secondary surface touch and we really don't want that to happen to our pets are trees, our flowers are waterfowl or our people. And thank you again for all of your hard work on this issue. Thank you so much. Next speaker, please. Anna Kristensen for the Protect, the Long Beach Low Cerritos Wetlands Coalition and Carp is a member organization. And I want to I want to say here that I didn't think this would happen. I mean, it just happened. And that and I look at the council members that are endorsing this, and I just want to thank you so much, because when I went to a Parks and Rec meeting with and Cantrell over a year ago, Parks and Rec was very polite, but they were just going to do a study. And then when the study found out that it was a little more expensive to use an organic pesticide and then round up, it seemed to be over. Case closed. And I just want to give a big shout out to Ann Cantrell tonight. You know, she's been active on this issue for a very long time, as well as others. And I know that she doesn't get, I think, the recognition and support she deserves because she is a community activist and she goes where where people don't really want to talk about it. So still in Eldorado Park when Roundup, we spray on the little wetlands out there. She came in with photographs. Right. And so I just she her name is bad and she can't be here tonight. And so I want to thank and and I want to thank the council. And I hope that people support this measure also that it extends to our wetlands. And SYMMES Pond seems to be on everybody's mind lately, including the neighbors, because the pond is totally dried out. Now, I think there's an issue there that they said they were cutting some kind of a budget for Sam's Pond. But I don't I think you need to spend a little more money out there and a Long Beach property in the wetlands. And I'll tell you, one of the problems is with the trees. They where they do tend to take over and they're very expensive to dig out and do it the right way. And even someone who doesn't want to use Roundup was was considering using some kind of herbicide in the wetlands simply because of the Tully thing. So if we can boated, if we can find money, I think we can get community support, we can build two boats were already talking about it getting some volunteers are excited about doing that and thriving that Native American tradition. So anyway, as a community, I think this is a great moment. I think I'm just very grateful. I'm grateful to the mayor for understanding like, you know, we don't we don't need poisons, you know. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And our last speaker on the side of that. All right. And yes, mine will bring it down for smaller people. My name is Ramon from District five. I am. I know that this thing's going to pass. I just wanted. To honor our lost in Darryl Supernova. And Roberto. You're wrong, guy for bringing this forward. I appreciate that. If Mongo is involved with that, I appreciate that too. As well as the director in the. Complete park staff. You guys are doing a great job. I. But in working with Marie, I actually arranged a meeting. This thing is a lot simpler, I think, than what a lot of people think. As far as the suggestion goes, there's been a demonstration and there's been some instruction given to the park staff. I arranged a meeting with with the park staff and the city of Long Beach. L.A. Unified School District and the EPA. They have some even equipment. That can be used if you don't want to do that. You know, the chemical thing, there's also an equipment. Option and. Also. A. Neat little program that they have. It's free and. It can not only deal with. Roundup and these things, but all the other pesticides. It's a pretty cool deal and I hope that everything works. I mean, I know when I was talking to Marie, she was very optimistic in at least looking into this and trying it out and making sure this thing works. But she didn't. Want to step in. And step on anybody that was coming in because she was getting ready to leave. Two years ago, I provided. The city during a budget meeting. A petition for about 3000 people. Plus to get. The water. Get the parks 100%. What they need. At the time, it. Was only about 36%. Of what they were watering. One of the reasons why, as I understand it, that Roundup was put in was because they wanted to get water to the tree roots. And that's just one of the reasons. And so by removing the the the grass, they would be able to water the trees down there. And so now that we've got 100% watering, maybe some of the organic things may not be needed. I know a lot of people there's been a lot the cities, their school districts, there's a lot of. Municipalities that. Have removed Roundup. From their thing. So there's plenty of options that are available. So I just wanted to say thanks to all of you and I'm hitting the road. You guys have a great day. I got to go for a road run. Thanks, buddy. Thank you. With that, please cast your votes. I mean, I can't remember Andrews washing cars. Thank you. Then last. Thank you. The last. The last item that was asked to be moved up is 1121. And then after 21, we'll go to the regular agenda from starting with public comment down to all the regular items.