(Photo by Richard Danielson/Tampa Bay Times)
The Tampa (Fla.) Sports Authority plans to use the controversial chemical, Curfew, to control turfgrass-destroying nematodes on the city’s three public courses, starting with an application at the Babe Zaharias GC on June 10. Residents have protested the fumigant’s use in the past, and once succeeded in having the manufacturer back off for fear of legal repercussions. But other treatments have gone on as planned, and citizens are now especially concerned about the dangers this year’s might pose in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.
Residents of the Forest Hills neighborhood of Tampa, Fla. have mobilized to protest the planned application on June 10th of the soil fumigant Curfew at the city’s Babe Zaharias Golf Course, the Tampa Bay Times reported.
The Tampa Sports Authority plans to use the chemical on all three of the city’s public courses, the Times reported, to kill parasitic nematodes, the ringworm that can destroy turfgrass on the three city-owned golf courses. And that’s revived a battle that’s surfaced over Curfew’s use in the past.
A year-long battle ended in 2009, the Times reported, when Dow Agroscience, which manufactured Curfew at that time, told the Sports Authority it wouldn’t follow through with a planned application because of the public opposition. In a statement, Dow said then it “will not place the applicator, itself, or the product in a volatile situation that could result in unfounded allegations, the unnecessary expenditure of regulatory resources or potential litigation.”
But the turf treatment and the opposition resumed in 2016, the Times reported, amid criticism that the Authority provided incomplete or misleading notices to the public. And in May 2017, some Forest Hills residents protested outside the Sports Authority’s offices at Raymond James Stadium, carrying homemade signs reading, “Don’t Poison Us” and “Don’t Fumigate the Babe.” But the treatments went on as planned.
At the end of May, the Times reported, residents found out that Curfew will be returning in 2020, when the Authority mailed 990 notices to neighbors of the Babe Zaharias course to tell them it would be applied on June 10.
The authority also plans to use Curfew at the other two city-owned golf courses it manages, Rocky Point and Rogers Park, the Times reported, but hasn’t yet mailed notices to residents in those neighborhoods because the treatment dates haven’t yet been finalized, according to Bobby Silvest, the Authority’s Vice President for Marketing and Communications.
Applying the chemical this year during the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, Forest Hills residents told the Times, is especially alarming.
“It’s ludicrous,’’ said Robert Lawson, whose home abuts the third fairway of the Babe Zaharias course. “If they do this and there’s a problem during the pandemic, it’s going to be really, really bad.’’
“It’s a probable human carcinogen, and I think right now we already are paying for screwing up Mother Earth big time,’’ added Debra McCormack, who can see the seventh hole of the Zaharias course from her front yard.
The active ingredient in Curfew is 1,3-dichloropropene, the Times reported. Its warning label says it is suspected of causing cancer and can be fatal if swallowed and enters air passages. It also causes skin, eye and respiratory irritation. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency classifies it as a probable carcinogen.
Silvest told the Times that the Authority, over the past four years, has tried “numerous alternative methods … to treat for nematodes with minimal success.’’ The Authority’s maintenance contractor, ABM Golf Services, recommends Curfew “as the most effective option to treat for the infestation of nematodes.’’
Curfew is now manufactured by Corteva Agriscience, formerly a division of DowDupont, that spun off into a stand-alone company last year, the Times reported. It’s been used in Florida on golf courses and sports fields since 2001. But Florida remains one of just five states—Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas are the others—where Curfew is registered for use in the U.S.
Certified workers using specialized equipment inject Curfew into the soil and post warnings after treatment, the Times reported. After the application, the soil releases sweet-smelling gases. The course is closed to golfers for 24 hours as part of the treatment.
In prior years, Hillsborough County’s Environmental Protection Commission conducted air-quality tests for 24 hours after the application and measured readings “well below the acceptable level,” Silvest told the Times. The air quality tests will be conducted again this year, he added.
But that provides little comfort to those opposed to its use, the Times reported.
“If it could possibly give people cancer, then based on precautionary principles it should not be used at all,” said McCormack. “I am rabidly against killing people, and especially killing taxpayers with their own damn money.”
Lawson told the Times that he believed the Curfew gas made him ill back in the mid-2000s, when no advance public notices were given to residents. He said he then took his concerns to the Florida Department of Agriculture, and the company that treated the golf course was fined for using the pesticide too close to homes.
Initially, Curfew required a 100-foot buffer between the application area and occupied buildings, but in 2007, the state reduced the safety zone to 30 feet, the Times reported.
The concerns expressed by residents go beyond air quality, the Times reported. The karst topography of the region makes groundwater susceptible to contamination, said McCormack. Karst topography is formed from soluble rocks like limestone dissolving, leaving sinkholes and underground caves as common features.
Curfew’s warning label says it is not to be applied within 100 feet of a potable water well or the edge of a karst topographical feature like a spring or sinkhole, the Times reported.
“If the label restrictions for Curfew do restrict its use over areas of karst geology, this would include all of Tampa, north of Kennedy Boulevard,” Mark Stewart, professor emeritus in the school of geosciences at the University of South Florida, wrote previously to Tampa City Council.
Not everyone is opposed to the application, the Times reported. An announcement about the pending pesticide application posted on May 27th on the Forest Hills Neighborhood Association Facebook page drew few immediate comments.
“Thanks for doing what’s needed to care for the course,” one woman wrote.
But another post called it “irresponsible” to apply a known respiratory irritant amid the concerns of COVID-19 respiratory illness.
Three years ago, Lawson told the Times, he left the neighborhood and stayed with family members for three days following the Curfew application. This time, he booked an Airbnb.
“This stuff is really dangerous,” he said. “I’m dumbstruck.”
McCormack said she previously fled to a motel across town. But she’s not sure what to do now.
“During a pandemic,” she asked, “where can you go that is safe?”
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