School Bells and School Green: Dissing the Toxins

By Jane Holtz Kay

School bells ring. Out come the pernicious chemical agents, the sprays, the poisons going for the germs, bashing the bugsŠand assailing the students. As surely as the seasons change and school begins, the not-so-green attack method of pest cleanup has hit our youngest and frailest population.

Now, however, some advocates have begun to shun the Mr. Mean-but-Clean ways of battling germs or greening lawns, to enlist more biological methods to eliminate pests and protect students. Brandishing some of the strictest standards in the nation, Toxics Action Center lead Massachusetts to become the latest state (after California, New York and Michigan) -- the most stringent -- to pass legislation to clean up the poisons that fill the dwelling spaces of our most fragile population.

The state's Children and Families Protection Act slated to go on the ballot in 200l attracted so many signers that the legislature (hardly the most progressive in the nation), passed the act for this year. Looking to integrated pest management rather than pesticides, the advocates at the center have carried out their mandate insisting that imagination, good housekeeping and, uniquely, a good community connection and follow-up system can do more than poisons.

Enlisting the parents really matters, says Leslie Ayers, field organizer for the Toxics Action Center working with MassPirg. The method of parental involvement and broadcasting has spread. One mother working at a Wellesley, Mass., and speaking on a panel at the Northeast Organic Farmers last spring, told of pouring honey into a wasp hive dug into the ground. A skunk came. The insects were toast.

The act's 13-page document says simply enough that "the department shall promote the use of biologic controls, integrated pest management, sustainable agriculture and other alternate pest control methods through education, technical assistance and research in order to reduce or eliminate, whenever possible, human or environmental exposures to chemical pesticides."

Chemically-spewn lawns also got a good licking in the provision that denies pesticides for aesthetics "just because grass isn't as green as they'd like," as Ayers puts it. Still another item relates to how chemicals are applied. "You can't use foggers," she says, just baits, gels or strips that are not likely to douse children. dousing.

Meanwhile, back at home, parents get sheets notifying them of "when, what and why" a spraying or treatment is underway, as mandated by the act. They lend extra support to the alert and enforcement system at individual schools around the state.

The school itself gets help, too, the organization feels. "It's a win win situation," says Ayre. Instead of acting after the bugs land, school maintenance workers are sent to fix broken screens or doors and thus help the building department keep up the space. "It really is just common sense and it prevents children from pesticides," she says. "It's more than a plan. It's a holistic way of thinking."

The Toxics Action Center has other conspicuous programs. Its dirty dozen pollutants are a well-publicized list of dumpsites, brownfields and chemically laden cauldrons. It has convinced the Bay State to stop spraying pesticides to stop the outbreak of the West Nile Virus. Other activist policies work against bad neighbors in contaminated neighborhoods. But the call to make schools and parks "for play, not spray" echoes loudly. Beginning at the beginning of life must count as one of the Center's soundest moves.

Originally published in the Green Guide, Summer 2002

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