Oregon Public Broadcasting

The Environmental Protection Agency announced tighter restrictions Friday on the use of pesticides near streams. But as Rob Manning reports, the new rules please neither environmental groups nor farmers.

The environmental law firm Earthjustice, says EPA’s stream buffers should help salmon – but not as much as a more stringent approach suggested by the National Marine Fisheries’ Service.

And farm groups are worried that restricting three very common, though highly toxic, insecticides would unnecessarily hurt their bottom line. 

Terry Witt is with Oregonians for Food and Shelter. It’s a group that lobbies to protect pesticide use. Witt says federal agencies are battling for supremacy when it comes to environmental rules.

Terry Witt: “It almost appears to us that we’re seeing a situation of one-up-man’s ship, that EPA is going to flex its muscle. And again, it’s all predicated on potential impact, not impacts that are shown to be the case.”  

But environmentalists say that the federal fisheries’ service determined conclusively that current rules weren't strong enough to guarantee salmon survival.