Health Schools Act of 2000/California School IPM

The Pesticide Regulatory Affairs Committee of the California Agricultural Commissioners and Sealers Association appointed Mr. Cato Fiksdal, Los Angeles County Agricultural Commissioner (CAC), to work with the Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) on issues related to the Healthy Schools Act of 2000. Mr. Stacy Carlsen, Marin CAC; Mr. Dave Frieders, San Francisco CAC; Ms. Kathleen Thuner, San Diego CAC; and Mr. Mark Tognazzini, San Benito CAC also participate in the technical advisory group. The group also includes Mr. Tony Hesch, California Department of Education; and DPR staff. The group’s purpose is to coordinate CAC interface with implementation of the Healthy Schools Act and the California School IPM Program.

The group recently requested that DPR provide all CACs with some examples of the annual written notification of expected pesticide use, opportunity to register, and warning signs that school districts have developed and use, as required by the Healthy Schools Act (Education Code sections 17608 through 17613). Attached you will find examples from several school districts that meet or exceed the requirements of the law:

• Attachment 1: Notice of annual expected pesticide use-Ojai Unified School District
• Attachment 2: Notice of annual expected pesticide use and opportunity to register to receive notification of individual pesticide applications-Davis Joint Unified School District
• Attachment 3: See attachment 2-Los Angeles Unified School District
• Attachment 4: Warning sign-Los Angeles Unified School District
• Attachment 5: Warning sign-Tahoe Truckee Unified School District

School districts may choose to implement an IPM program. Developing an IPM policy is the first step in making the transition from a conventional pest management program to an IPM program. Attached you will find examples of IPM policies from several school districts that have adopted policies and have implemented IPM programs:

• Attachment 6: IPM Policy-Novato Unified School District
• Attachment 7: IPM Policy-San Diego Unified School District

We are always interested in seeing examples of any of these documents that other school districts have developed. Please send any examples you might have to DPR, Attention: Mr. Tom Babb, Associate Environmental Research Scientist, Pest Management and Licensing Branch, 1001 I Street, Sacramento, California 95814, or by e-mail at tbabb@cdpr.ca.gov.

For more information on these topics, please see DPR’s home page at www.cdpr.ca.gov and click on School IPM. Please contact Mr. Tom Babb, of my staff, at (916) 324-4100 if you have any questions about these examples.

Sincerely,