Disbelief over state plan to spray neurotoxin into oyster beds

‘As a retired nuclear power-plant operator, Ross Barkhurst, 70, is by no means an environmentalist. In fact he spent his career clashing with them.

But even he’s shocked by what just got approved in our supposedly green Washington state: They’re going to use crop-dusting helicopters to spray into the oyster beds of Willapa Bay a neurotoxic pesticide that has a warning right on the bottle: “Do not apply directly to water.”

“I’m no greenie, but this state’s going to make one out of me yet,” says Barkhurst, who lives on Willapa Bay, near South Bend. “They have no idea what this is going to do to the ecosystem. Their program is ‘spray and hope.’”’

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