Aloha
Yesterday Kaua`i County Council passed a bill to put $50,000 towards studying the odiferous drift sickening teachers and students at Waimea Canyon Middle School. This bill has been heard 3 times in the last month. The bill now needs a signature and additional funding from the Governor in order ot go forward

While some were concerned it would only look at stinkweed and not pesticides, the consensus was to start somewhere. Others were against the county giving money to the state at all.

Before the last hearing, the DOA said they would take county money to look at the stinkweed and they would look at the pesticide drift by matching the $50,000. DOA then put CTAHR in charge of doing both studies.The questionable confidence in CTAHR doing the study was discussed, as was the relationship CTAHR has with the seed companies.

Yesterday two men from CTAHR (Oahu) testified, Dr. Li and Dr. Rauch (sp?).
They said they would love for the students to help gather data on this study. The intend to gather ambient air samples and have the DOH toxicologist on Oahu do the lab work.

The principal from Kekaha's St Theresa School, as well as residents from the westside, including County council candidate Bruce Pleas, shared their mana`o. 2 staff members from Waimea school testified that they concluded the illnesses were from stink weed.

In the end, the language was inserted that the county would only release the money if the state matched the funds. Now the entire process is at the Governor's desk for a signature. The feeling is that it is unlikely that Gov. Lingle will sign it, as funding has been greatly restricted in the last few weeks as the economy falls apart.

If you are moved to call Gov Lingle and ask her to please fund this study, it would surely be appreciated.

This hearing will be televised on Hoike channel 53 over the next week.

Malama i ka honua,
Jeri