A number of aldermen and anti-pesticide activists are ticked at Ald. John Mar after he voted against a city ban on pesticides on Monday giving opponents of the ban the eight votes they needed to spike it.
"He gave every indication that he was going to support the committee recommendations and then he bailed" said Ald. Joe Ceci who added Mar was "flip-flopping."
Ald. Brian Pincott was also steamed. "We had the recommendations before us and in the end John Mar — who said he would support them — voted against [the ban]" he said.
I spoke with Mar this morning and asked him if that’s correct — that he’d changed his mind last-minute on the pesticide ban. "Never" Mar answered.
"In every discussion that I’ve had with anyone on it I said ‘Listen I’m not up for an outright ban’" he said. I’ve got a copy of an e-mail Mar sent to a citizen last week saying exactly that.
"Did I campaign saying I was going to support the creation of a pesticide bylaw? Yes I did" Mar told me. "Did I say I was going to ban it on city lands? Yes I did and yes I would if that was a recommendation that was brought before us. What we saw was a blanket statement [an] incremental phase out over time. Period. Didn’t say on public property."
But in the past Mar has supported a ban on public and private property — or at least he said he did. A Coalition for a Healthy Calgary survey done before the 2007 election ( here’s the PDF ) asked candidates: "Would you support a bylaw phasing out the cosmetic use of pesticides on private and public lands in Calgary?"
Mar’s answer according to the results of that survey: "Yes."
Mar’s the guy taking all the heat this week but aldermen Jim Stevenson Ray Jones Joe Connelly Andre Chabot all answered "yes" as well — and they all voted against the ban on Monday.
Here’s Connelly’s response to the survey question: "…[The] 18000 Calgarians involved in ‘Imagine Calgary’ and the resulting strategy to eliminate pesticide use by 2010 tells me that Calgarians care. Calgarians have spoken. It is incumbent upon government to put the mechanism in place to ensure this important goal is achieved."
Jones’s response: "I am in favour of phasing them [cosmetic pesticides] out as long as there are viable methods of controlling weeds and insects."
Chabot: "Yes I would support a bylaw phasing out the cosmetic use of pesticides on private and public lands in Calgary. Thank you for your effort in this matter."
How things change…
