That is the phrase used for the first time we can recall in the County release about the spraying of West Chester schedule for this 9/11 evening (unless rain intervenes). For the full document, see “Happy Patriots’ Day, West Chester, from the Chesco Health Department.”

Now we are in possession of the document that must be at the origin of that phrase. Download it here: DEP DH contract for 2018. It’s basically an application to the PA DEP for a maximum of $102,680.40 to aid in anti-mosquito spraying in 2018. (That’s just a portion of the total expense, of course.)

Pages 1-22 are standard bureaucratic stuff. The interesting part comes on pp. 23-25 of the pdf: “2018 Addenda – Scope of Work.” The underlined paragraphs are the actual County submission for the state money.

So the Health Dept wrote its own ticket, telling the State what it wanted to do, the State said OK, and now the County is saying it has to abide by its contract with the state… which it wrote! Circular reasoning, anyone? And still, nothing there says when the County has to spray.

We need to dig deeper, but at this point it is hard to find evidence that the County has lived up to its stated intentions regarding public education, outreach to municipalities, and larviciding. We need to go the Right To Know route, since the information flow to the public has been cut off.

The only positive in the document is that the County commits to 48 hours notice (previously 24). They do not commit to skipping homes of hypersensitive individuals but in the last couple of years they have provided a small buffer around registered hypersensitives and registered apiarists.

Is there another “contractual guidelines/agreement”? We’ll find out.