Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Environmental Health topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Residents urge Health Commission to review herbicide use in parks and natural areas
Summary
Public commenters from the San Francisco Forest Alliance and local residents told the Health Commission they are concerned about repeated herbicide applications in parks, cited IARC and pediatric studies linking glyphosate and other herbicides to cancer risk, and asked the department to review current practices and notice buffers.
Two public commenters called on the Health Commission to review the department’s and Recreation and Park Department’s use of herbicides in San Francisco parks and natural areas.
A representative reading a statement for the San Francisco Forest Alliance said the group is “concerned about the use of toxic herbicides in public places,” argued that glyphosate has been reassessed as a probable carcinogen, and urged that herbicides have no place in parks commonly used by children and pet owners. The commenter specifically criticized the Recreation and Park Department natural-areas program’s use of tier 1 and tier 2 herbicides in areas frequented by families and near watersheds.
Anastasia Glick Stern, who said she lives near Mount Davidson and has observed repeated treatments there, told the commission she has seen applications take place closer than the stated 15‑foot trail buffer and cited the International Agency for Research on Cancer’s 2015 reclassification of glyphosate as a probable carcinogen and an American Academy of Pediatrics meta-analysis associating herbicide exposure with a higher risk of childhood cancers.
Commissioners thanked the speakers and said their comments would be reviewed by the department. The record shows public-comment requests were received and the commission acknowledged it would pass the statements to staff for review; commissioners did not adopt new rules or take a formal vote in this meeting.
The speakers asked for more stringent notice practices, enforcement of existing buffer rules and a department review of the natural-areas herbicide program; the commission did not provide a timeline for that review during the meeting.
