Issues with mosquito spray plan

People have been hard at word for 3 years to try to bring a reasonable process to mosquito control ion West Chester Borough.

It’s important to remember that the citizen group Don’t Spray Me! never agreed to the West Nile Virus Response Plan and that Borough Council never voted on it.

The text that you can download on the Borough we site has this note on its title page: Developed: December 2016 Revised: The reason there is no Revised date is that it was not revised, because it died in Borough Council after objections particularly by a member of the Sustainability Advisory Committee.

That was the correct outcome, because it turned out that, despite the optimism of the moment, the West Nile Task Force (consisting of representatives of the Borough, Don’t Spray Me! and the Health Department) was never able to finalize the wording.

The fundamental disagreement on a critical issue remains; the County refused to agree to a compromise providing 2 potential paths to spraying, either:

1) Subject to agreement of West Chester Borough: sustained rise in laboratory-confirmed WNV-infected mosquito samples/birds in a single sampling location in 3 or more samples taken on different days over a period of at least a week; or

2) Immediate action as Chester County Health Department deems necessary, after one or more locally acquired laboratory-confirmed human cases of West Nile Encephalitis in West Chester Borough.

The County will not recognize that the Borough has a right to share the decision in even one of the 2 proposed routes to spraying.

This attitude should be unacceptable to residents who care about making reasonable decisions impacting their health and environment, and it goes against both the “clean air, pure water” guarantee of the PA constitution and the Community Bill of Rights in the Borough’s Home Rule Charter.

Since the beginning of 2017, all parties have acted as if the Response Plan were in place, but no one and no web site should give the impression that it is an approved plan, because it is not.

Other municipalities beware: ask the County if it will respect or even consider your wishes about pesticide spraying and see what it says,. Nathaniel Smith

West Chester

Warriors against abuse

Rep. Mark Rossi and state Attorney General Josh Shapiro deserve to be awarded a Nobel prize!

They are warriors for the weak and vulnerable and voiceless.

They are true dedicated public servants.

They have persistently and valiantly fought for our children in a scenario unimaginable and horrific.

They have fought relentlessly.

Their leadership and fortitude have brought some degree of recognition to a bizarre and evil culture in the Roman Catholic Institution.

Let us support them in moving still further to extend the Statute Of Limitations so that those abused and shattered may have the justice they deserve.

Their agony has no statute of Limitations. No reason not to do this! We cannot go back and rescue them but we can go forward!

We cannot look the other way with the inane and mindless phrase “It is not all of them” - I don’t think so! It is enough of them to have destroyed the lives of a incomprehensible numbers of young lives.

To acknowledge their inner turmoil and pain with the extension of the statue of Limitations and provide some degree of compensation and justice is the next step for recognition and justice. We must support Mark Rossi and Josh Shapiro. We must also be warriors for our innocent children.

We must defeat this vicious and secretive culture with some degree of justice for its innocent and vulnerable victims.

We cannot allow the power of money and lobbing to obstruct or minimize a situation so horrifically horrendous.

Thank you Mark Rossi and Josh Shapiro - Arch Angels of JUSTICE! Eileen M. Lyons West Goshen