PINEWOOD PLACE residents are fuming after lawns around the 50-unit townhouse complex were unexpectedly sprayed with herbicides early Tuesday morning. “We had no notification of this,” Beth Forrest said Tuesday. “And now we have been told that we should keep the kids off the grass for two days.” The mother of three said she had consequently been unable to take her children into her backyard, “and that is pretty difficult in this heat.” Because residents of the 850 West 17th St. townhouse complex have since washed the herbicides off Pinewood lawns with sprinklers, a spokesman for the company who sprayed the chemi- cals said the area might have to be resprayed. Thomson Spray Service Ltd. co-owner Cherri Thomson con- firmed Wednesday that a mixture of herbicides mecoprop and diacamba had been sprayed on Pinewood’s lawns to control clover and other broad-leafed weeds, but said both chemicals have moderate to low toxicity ratings. According to the B.C. gov- ernment’s handbook for pesticide applicators and dispensers, the oral LDS50 value of both is low to very low. LD50 is a toxicity rating that measures the amount of a chemical required to kill 50 per cent of test animals. The LDS5O rating of table salt, for example, is 3,320 compared with 650 to 930 for mecoprop and By TIMOTHY RENSHA News Repo 1,040 to 3,700 for diacamba. Mecoprop then is about five times as poisonous as table salt. Thomson said 3.4 litres of the herbicides, both of which are in Weed-n-Feed, were mixed in 200 gallons of water. The company, which has been in business since 1937, was contracted to spray the property by the Greater Vancouver Regional District, which owns Pinewood Place and owns approximately 3,100 rental units in the Lower Mainland area. A clause in the contract requires Thomson guarantee a 90 per cent weed kill factor. If sprinkling by residents has diluted the herbicide to a*point where that guarantee cannot be met, Thomson said the lawns might have to be resprayed. GVRD spokesman Bud Elsie said Wednesday the herbicides are being sprayed on 43 other GVRD properties around the Lower Mainland. “All except eight or nine have been done,” he said, ‘‘and we haven’t had any complaints from anywhere else.’” But he said individual tenants of Pinewood were not warned im- mediately prior to Tuesday’s spraying, ‘‘so [ think we have to NEWS photo Terry Peters A SOLITARY salmon leaps out of Capilano River waters. I and other Capilano salmon will be the subject of a Saturday morning demonstra- tion organized by the Capilano Conservation Association to protest Native fishing practices on the river. Fish population not threatened From page 1 food fishery has accounted for be- tween 6,000 and 7,000 Capilano coho thus far in 1988. The number, he said, was con- sistent with past years. He said the average number of coho harvested annually by band members was 19,000, ‘‘which, if you divide that by 500 (band members), is not an unreasonable food fish need.”’ Roxburgh said methods such as gaffing, which are used by band members when the river water level is fow, are unpleasant for the public to watch, ‘‘but what they are doing is no different from what is happening anywhere else in in- land Native food fisheries.’’ If the Capilano water levels were 10to 15 feet deeper, he said, Native fishermen would be stringing gillnets across the river, which would be far less disconcerting to the general public, but account for just as many fish being taken. In a CCA circular, the associa- tion calls for return of all fisheries management control to the federal government and ‘‘one law for all Canadians.” The circular also states that derogatory or discriminatory placards will nat be tolerated. Squamish Band chiefs Philip Joe and Joe Mathias were unavailable for comment to press time Thurs- day. 3 - Friday, July 22, 1988 - North Shore News SIGNS WARNING Pinewood Place residents of herbicide spraying sprung up on the North Vancouver townhouse complex’s lawns Tuesday morning. Residents are upset that no warning of the spraying was given. review our policy of how the GVRD notifies tenants in ad- vance.’” Elsie said the spraying had been ordered to control clover which tenants at some GVRD properties had complained presented a danger to children by attracting bees and wasps. But Pinewood resident Rick Anderson said, ‘‘There are no weeds on the property, and I don’t know of anyone who complained about them.”’ Union vs. a Sul NORTH Vancouver provin- cial court Judge I. Henley has adjourned a smal! claims dispute between a Lower Mainland union local and a North Vancouver City alderman pending the out- come of arbitration from an independent mediator. By TIMOTHY RENSHAW News Reporter Counsel for the plaintiff Office and Technical Employees Union Local 378 appeared in North Van- couver small claims court July 15 in an attempt to recoup the $119.61 unpaid balance of a $675.44 phone bill alleged to have been run up by Barbara Sharp when she was a union employee. The suit was originally filed in connection with what the union claims was Sharp’s unauthorized use of a union Watts telephone fine for personal rather than business calls. 35 Classified Ads.........41 Doug Collins.......... 9 Editorial Page......... 6 Home & Garden.......25 Bill Kimmett, the North Shore’s chief public health inspector, said the herbicides had a very low tox- icity level, but advised that children should stay off the sprayed area for two days and wash any residue off with soap and water, He added that the health department has written to the Greater Vancouver Housing Corp., which manages Pinewood iace for the GVRD, requesting it adhere in future to the North According to the claim, Sharp, who was elected a North Van- couver City alderman in 1987, log- ged a total of 19 hours and 29 minutes of personal calls on the union wants to collect on her telephone charpes. ALD. Barbara Sharp ... Watts line in 1986, which resulted in a union telephone bill of $675.44, The alderman worked for the Mailbox ... . Horth Shore Now...... TV Listings....:. What's Going On.......13 Shore’s voluntary Good Neighbor Pesticide Policy. . Instituted last year, the policy urges companies or residents who plan to use external herbicides or pesticides to give neighbers in the immediate area svarning of the date planned for spraying and what will be sprayed. ; But Thomson said because the herbicides had to be applied in dry windless conditions, it was almost impossible ‘to provide residents with accurate warning. f Ss. alderman t enters mediation union from September 1982 until the end of. May 1987, when she was laid off. Sharp has since attempted to pay $555.83 of the total through the court, but has declined to pay the balance, claiming she was not responsible for the calls involved. The union has not accepted the partial payment, insisting the en- tire amount be paid. Judge Henley adjourned the dispute pending the outcome of arbitration. The matter will only be brought before the court again if enforce- ment of the payment determined is required, Mediator Vince Ready will ar- ‘ bitrate the case. Sharp has claimed that the rules over what constituted a personal call were unclear, and that the union discriminated against her in filing the suit because it had not been determined who else had used the Waits line for calls that might have been con- sidered personal. No date had been set for the ar- bitration to press time. WEATHER Friday, mainly sunny. Highs 23-26°C. Saturday, sunny. Highs near 20-23°C.