Laguna Beach to consider more mowing, no spraying to get rid of plants that add to fire risk

City staffers are recommending crews stop using synthetic herbicide to reduce vegetation in wilderness areas and around the community to help cut down on potential fuel for wildfires and instead rely on more mowing and hand equipment.

The City Council on Tuesday, Jan. 9, will consider that option and a handful of others, including the continued use of a synthetic herbicide. A group of South Laguna residents concerned about the potential impacts of using Roundup to kill vegetation along trails, hillsides, and streets has been lobbying City Hall this last year to put an end to its use.

The intended goal of killing the vegetation is if a fire were to break out, having cleared the “fuel modification zones” would offer less vegetation for a fire to burn, slowing its advance and giving firefighters a chance to get the upper hand and residents more time to escape.

Hand crews and goats are also used to help eliminate unwanted vegetation to curb fire hazards.

Those zones encompass 400 acres throughout the city. The effort is part of a wide-ranging fire management plan rolled out by the city starting in 2019 with blessings from the California Coastal Commission.

The city contracts with Nature’s Image Inc. to conduct the spraying for the fuel modification efforts and with the Laguna Canyon Foundation to monitor that environmentally sensitive animals and plants are protected – for example, its biologists flagged patches of the Big-Leaved Crownbeard and Coulter’s Matilija Poppy, considered threatened in the state, in the past to be avoided. Around them, any weed removal was done by hand.

Following the complaints and petition effort of the South Laguna residents, city staff are recommending increasing the use of crews using weed whackers and other tools to mow down the plants and grasses before they became 3 feet tall. That would be done three times a year.

The change would come with a cost of $1.3 million a year, compared to the current program, which costs $528,000.

According to the staff’s report to the City Council, 113 acres were treated last year in fuel modification spraying and 3,719 ounces of Roundup were used.

“There is enough concern that this option merits consideration,” said Jeremy Frimond, assistant to the city manager, who also wrote the city’s staff report. “If the council approves this, we’ll do it for 2024 and determine if it can meet the Fire Department’s safety goals.”

While Ramin Pejan, one of the South Laguna residents involved in gathering signatures, praised the city’s proposal to keep Roundup use out of the fuel modification zones, he said they are perplexed that the city proposal includes its use still in habitat restoration areas required by the Coastal Commission.

As part of the permit to remove the invasive plants from the fuel modification zones, the city must identify and restore areas other areas of habitat.

“We are completely confused,” Pejan said. “We made this huge effort to get rid of it, for them now to say we’ll spray it everywhere else in our wilderness and canyons?”

“I appreciate they don’t want to use it near our streets, but to come around and say this is the restoration plan is one step forward and two steps back,” he added.

The resident are concerned the spray is toxic to the community and the environment.

Roundup contains the herbicide glyphosate, which is classified as a probable human carcinogen by the World Health Organization, though the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says its findings are the herbicide is not likely carcinogenic to humans when used as directed. Debate and legal challenges have gone on for years.

“Bayer stands fully behind our glyphosate-based products, which have been used safely and successfully around the world for 50 years,” Kyel Richard, a spokesperson for the company that sells Roundup, said in a previous statement to the newspaper in response to the residents’ concerns. “Leading health regulators around the world have repeatedly concluded that our glyphosate-based products can be used safely as directed.”

Frimond said that Roundup would be used in restoration areas far away from the public. One location being considered is about 5 acres in the backcountry near Aliso and Wood Canyons Wilderness Park.

“It has to be restored to high-value habitat as part of a special condition for our permit,” he said. “It will take three to five years, and a fence would be put around it. We would plant native plants and do targeted removal of the invasives. That’s where the herbicide would come in.”

Pejan said he would also like the city to “present clearer information on the risks of glyphosate since the report still recommends its use for habitat restoration.”

“We believe that using it for habitat restoration still presents major risks to the soil and ecosystem that cannot be glossed over by the council or city staff while it considers using glyphosate for habitat restoration,” he said.

Frimond said he understands the residents’ concerns, but believes the city’s plan is good.

“We wouldn’t knowingly harm the community,” he said, “and don’t believe we are doing that.”