Marblehead turning green without toxics

By Lisa Capone, Globe Correspondent, 3/31/2002

ARBLEHEAD - Chip Osborne's two springer spaniels used to rest under his greenhouse benches. So did the runoff from the pesticides he sprayed on his plants. When cancer claimed both young dogs in the mid-1980s, Osborne decided his own definition of ''safe'' was at odds with assurances from the chemical industry and government regulators.

''I basically killed them both. I know in my mind that that was attributable to the chemicals that I used,'' said Osborne, owner of the now-organic Osborne Florist and Greenhouse and a member of Marblehead's Recreation, Parks and Forestry Board. ''When you are in your mid-30s and have a young family, you realize you are playing with fire.''

Osborne's epiphany came about the same time Pat Beckett was pushing a baby carriage past chemically green lawns in a Long Island suburb and becoming increasingly uneasy about the health hazards of pesticides. After moving to Marblehead seven years ago, Beckett joined an organic garden group and founded the Marblehead Pesticide Awareness Committee. Today, Beckett and Osborne cochair the committee - a tiny group whose huge vision fueled a Board of Health policy that bans the use of synthetic chemicals on most town-owned land and requires organic practices at parks, playing fields, and open spaces covering more than 650,000 square feet of this seaside town.

Marblehead is among many cities and towns striving to reduce toxics. On April 23, Swampscott's Pesticide Awareness Committee will go before that town's Board of Health to discuss creating an organic management policy for town-owned land, said committee member Sue Burgess. The Swampscott Department of Public Works avoids herbicides and pesticides, except on trees in the town cemetery, but there isn't a formal policy.

''We're not where Marblehead is,'' she said.

Perhaps no other Massachusetts community is, according to the state Office of Environmental Affairs. Office spokesman Doug Pizzi said he is ''not aware of any others'' with an explicit organic-only policy. Neither is Sarah Little, who is working toward an organic policy for Wellesley's municipal lands and heads a regional pesticide awareness collaborative that recently provided training for officials and residents from 21 cities and towns, including Marblehead, Swampscott, and Winthrop.

The state, through the Toxics Use Reduction Network at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, has awarded Marblehead's Pesticide Awareness Committee $12,000 since 1999 to develop a ''Living Lawn'' organic garden demonstration site, run educational seminars for lawn care professionals and citizens, and conduct a community-wide public awareness campaign.

Osborne and public health director Wayne Attridge said they believe the publicity has resulted in fewer homeowners using chemical lawn care services now than a few years ago.

''Most people, when they learn the risks, choose not to use pesticides,'' Little said, ''because it's kind of a no-brainer - dandelions or cancer?''

The committee's work prompted the organic landscape management policy adopted by the Marblehead Board of Health in May. The ''driving impetus,'' said Attridge, was a study about four years ago that showed Marblehead's incidence of two types of cancer was higher than the state average.

The town's policy relies on soil testing, addition of materials to foster optimal growth of beneficial microorganisms in the earth, introduction of natural predators - such as other insects - to combat pests, deep watering, aeration, and rigorous overseeding of grass to crowd out weeds.

Osborne said he ''makes no bones about the fact that initially the costs are expected to be higher'' with an organic management program. He said once the program takes hold - in about three years - ''costs decrease markedly'' because potential pest problems are prevented, ''as opposed to a chemical program where you have a fixed cost and costs escalate as inflation escalates.''

John Buechner, an official with a New Jersey company that uses pesticides, disputed the health risk statements of pesticide opponents.

''The science really doesn't back up the environmentalists' claims,'' said Buechner, technical services director for Lawn Doctor Inc., which applies chemical pesticides on approximately 250,000 backyards in 38 states, including Massachusetts.

Buechner said all products approved for sale by the US Environmental Protection Agency have been screened and found by the agency to pose an ''acceptable risk.''

''I'm not aware of any conclusive evidence linking pesticides to any health risks,'' said Buechner, who has been in the pesticide business for 20 years. ''It's really more of a perception-based thing.''

Organic supporters say, however, that the EPA's product registration process does not guarantee public health or environmental safety. Beckett pointed to the EPA's decisions in 2000 and 2001 to ban home and garden use of dursban and diazinon - two pesticides that were widely marketed for many years.

Last July, Osborne said, the town increased the Recreation, Parks and Forestry Department's budget from $5,000 to $20,000 to pay for soil testing and materials needed for the organic program. The department got an additional $4,800 to purchase a spreader for applying organic compost. Year two of the program is just under way. Recreation, Parks and Forestry Superintendent Tom Hamond said his crew will begin applying lime to raise soil pH in the next two weeks, and overseeding will occur later in April. Hamond acknowledged that not everyone in town is convinced of the new policy's wisdom.

''I think the jury is still out on this,'' he said. ''Some people want to see immaculate fields with no weeds whatsoever. That's almost impossible. There has to be a tolerance level.''

While Hamond's department, the Cemetery Commission, and the Conservation Commission are following the Board of Health policy, the Marblehead School Department is the conspicuous holdout.

Assistant School Superintendent George Gearhart said the schools adhere to state guidelines governing application of pesticides on school grounds. Those rules call for notifying parents before an outside pesticide application takes place and keeping chemically treated fields off-limits to students for several days. Inside school buildings, most pesticides can't be used while school is in session.

Gearhart said his department recently spent more than $2 million to renovate, grade, and reseed athletic fields at the middle and high schools and fears that swearing off all chemicals - particularly herbicides - might not ''protect our investment.'' The fields are expected to be ready for use next fall and spring.

''The School Committee's opinion is that a balanced approach is better in the long run - better for the fields in the long run, and certainly less expensive,'' Gearhart said.

But not better for children's health, according to the Pesticide Awareness Committee. Beckett pointed to a May 5 Boston University School of Medicine forum on the role environmental chemicals play in children's learning and developmental disorders as evidence of the link between pesticides and childhood diseases such as cancer.

''There is most definitely a connection between pesticides and this decline in children's health,'' Beckett said, maintaining that most information about how to maintain athletic fields still comes from the chemical manufacturing industry.

T he Marblehead Pesticide Awareness Committee's next public workshop on organic lawn and garden care takes place at 8:30 a.m. April 16. To register, call 781-631-7214.

Lisa Capone can be reached at capone@globe.com.

This story ran on page 1 of the Boston Globe's North Weekly section on 3/31/2002.
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