I have reported the Anastasia Mosquito Control District of St. Johns County to federal criminal law enforcement officials with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
I have requested an investigation of possible felony violations of the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
This is not the first time that Mosquito Control failed to instruct its aerial spraying contractor not to spray around St. Johns County's 28 bald eagle nests, protected by federal law.
Insipid insolence and insouciance from our mosquito control district, which adopted at my urging a policy requiring instructions to contractor pilots to avoid bald eagle nests since 2010 but never notified its contractors of bald eagle locations before spraying in 2016.
This may constitute a "taking" in violation of the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Slavin
To: xueamcd
Sent: Tue, Nov 15, 2016 5:55 pm
Subject: AMCD Possible Violations of Migratory Bird Treaty Act and Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act in Aerial Organophosphate Spraying
Dear Dr. Xue and Mr. Flowers:
1. By Anastasia Mosquito Control District of St. Johns County (AMCD) inexplicably not providing our AMCD aerial spraying contractor with any maps of 28 bald eagle nest locations, AMCD appears to have violated board policy on protecting bald eagle nests during aerial spraying.
2. Government agencies must follow their own rules. Service v. Dulles, 354 U.S. 363 (1957).
3. AMCD may have violated the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act -- federal felonies.
4. We thought AMCD had learned its lesson after prior spraying without notifying the contractor of bald eagle nest locations.
5. Please provide all maps, data, memos, e-mails, voicemails, text messages and root cause analysis without any further delay in response to my October 19, 2016 Open Records Request 2016-422 (below) -- it has been 27 days! Your silence is inculpatory.
6. AMCD must cease and desist from all aerial organophosphate pesticide spraying near our 28 bald eagle nests.
7. Please agree to follow AMCD policy on drawing a red line around each of the 28 bald eagle nests from this day forward. Thank you for your prompt attention to this urgent matter. Now, please.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
 |
-----Original Message-----
From: Rui-de Xue
To: Ed Slavin
Sent: Sun, Nov 13, 2016 11:18 am
Subject: Re: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.?
Dear Ed:
My answers are following your questions.
We do not know this.
Thanks.
Rudy
Sent from my iPhone
On Nov 13, 2016, at 7:26 AM, Ed Slavin
Dear Dr. Xue and Mr. Flowers:
A. Please respond to my October 19, 2016 Open Records Request No. 2016-422 no later than 4 PM on November 14, 2016.
B. Were any of St. Johns County's 28 legally protected bald eagle nests sprayed with organophosphates (DIBROM/NALED) by the helicopter contractor working for Anastasia Mosquito Control District of St. Johns County after Hurricane Matthew?
Yes ____
No ____
Let's check the distribution and locations of the nests if the nests were in the sprayed areas. The spraying was only a partial areas of west I-95.
C. Was St. Johns County's map of our 28 bald eagle nests ever provided to the helicopter contractor in advance of the organophosphate spraying, as is required by AMCD policy?
Yes ____
No ____No, we didn't provide this without knowledge.
http://ftp.bocc.co.st-johns.fl.us/gis/media/mapmart/Bald_Eagle_Map.pdf
D. Was the AMCD helicopter contractor ever instructed not to spray organophosphates near our county's 28 bald eagle nests?
Yes ____
No ____No.
E. What about the other sensitive areas in Request No. 2016-422?
Yes __yes, we did for all.
No ____
Mr. Weaver and Mrs. Gaines, please provide the spray map to Ed after the FMCA meeting.
F. Please provide maps, instructions, e-mails, data and documents re: bald eagle nests and organophosphate spraying no later than 4 PM on November 14, 2016.
Thank you.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Rui-de Xue
To: Ed Slavin
Cc: wflowers
Sent: Sat, Oct 22, 2016 3:32 am
Subject: Re: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.?
Dear Ed,
Please just to be patient, since last Saturday, we have received and processed over 3000 requests for mosquito spraying. Supervisor Kay Gaines and I have worked and on-call for 24 hrs a day, I do not know whether she get enough sleep everyday, at least I can only sleep for 3-4 hours per day to deal with these outbreaks and stress, especially the non dependable contractor for aerial spraying with shortages of aircrafts and pesticide supplies due to large demands for aerial spraying by many agencies. If we have any aerial capability, it wouldn't happen like this every time.
Sorry, we didn't know the requests for notice to the contractor for bald eagle nests, thank you very much and appreciate for let's know this. We informed beekeepers, organic farmers, and the people who are on the non-spray list and other related agencies.
We don't spray Anastasia Island, all eastern intercoastal areas, downtown, all conservation lands and areas. This time, we asked our contractor for spraying for the most hot areas in the west US1. The contractor were short of planes and pesticides, the spraying plan, areas, and date with schedule had been charged every 2-3 hours. Finally they sprayed the most hot spots in partial west I-95 and we get many relief yesterday. We have to work on this weekend to continue the west I-95 areas by ground application. I went to field with employees everyday to figure out what was going on and where the mosquitoes came from after 5-6 dried months and how bad the mosquito population was. It was unbelievable that the people who are living around the wood areas couldn't open the doors. After several day spraying, I had the 2nd time experience for the huge number of mosquitoes to attack at several residential backyards at the world golf village yesterday. They did get aerial spraying. After we did thermal fogging to quickly knockdown the population in the spots, the people, especially the seniors were so happy and appreciates. When I saw these and did what we could help the people, and made me tirelessly to try to do more as much as possible.
Today the weather seems little cool and hope slowing down with the mosquitoes. Hopefully the residents, our employees have opportunity to get some breaks. During the emergency operation, Luck me to have the most wonderful and dedicated staff and employees with strong support Board of Commissioners. Thanks them for their service very much.
I replied your requests in the middle of night that is our technicians who are going to spray. Hope you understand.
Kay, please send the contractor to Ed, when you have time Monday.
Best regards,
Rudy
Sent from my iPhone
On Oct 21, 2016, at 4:34 PM, Ed Slavin
Dear Dr. Xue and Mr. Flowers:
1. Please respond with documents and data, today.
2. If you don't, I will have to assume AMCD broke the law again. I would therefore have to report this to the National Response Center and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service criminal investigators re: possible violations of the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Slavin
To: xueamcd
Cc: jmoe01
Sent: Fri, Oct 21, 2016 10:10 am
Subject: Re: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.?
Dear Dr. Xue and Mr. Flowers:
A. Please respond to Request No. 2016-422 this morning.
B. Were our county's 26 bald eagle nests sprayed with organophosphates (DIBROM/NALED)?
Yes ____
No ____
C. Were maps of the bald eagle nests provided to the contractor in advance of the spraying?
Yes ____
No ____
Thank you.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Ed Slavin
To: xueamcd
Cc: jmoe01
Sent: Thu, Oct 20, 2016 10:13 am
Subject: Re: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.
Dear Dr. Xue:
Did we tell contractor what areas to avoid (bald eagle nests, etc.)?
Please provide documents.
THANK YOU!
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Dr. Rui-De Xue
To: 'Ed Slavin'
Cc: jmoe01
Sent: Thu, Oct 20, 2016 9:20 am
Subject: RE: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.
Dear Ed,
Let us get this back to you later. The contractor could not handle the situation due to serval county’s requests for emergency at eastern coastal areas this time.
I have not seen such huge amount of service requests for spraying due to outbreak of mosquito population and disease risks/concerns caused by the hurricane and flooding. It is much worse than the situation in 2004 and 2005.
Based on my past many year (38) experience, such small amount (0.5-0.6 O.Z. per acre) did not impact human, pet, non-target, and crops significantly. Honey bees are inside at night. It has very short residue and easy break down after spraying within 24 hr at such small amount. Actually, I grow up by eating the crops treated by naled for agricultural pest control when I was in China. I was in Flagler Estate last night to check the spraying under and after the spray and tried to figure out any smell and feeling.
We have worked very hard to control the emergency situation since last Friday at day time and night time. Everybody get so tired for this. Hopefully, we get some breaks soon.
Best regards,
Rudy
From: Ed Slavin [mailto:easlavin@aol.com]
Sent: Wednesday, October 19, 2016 12:44 PM
To: xueamcd@gmail.com
Cc: jmoe01@gmail.com
Subject: Request No. 2016-422: Notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.
Dear Dr. Xue:
Please provide copies of the notice to helicopter contractor re: beekeepers, bald eagle nests, alligator farm, etc.
Thank you.
With kindest regards, I am,
Sincerely yours,
Ed Slavin
904-377-4998
www.cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com
www.edslavin.com
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