This is a local story that bleeds into the area of national security and the congressional races. Dan Lungren was warned about the situation last year but apparently completely ignored it. This involves the smuggling of foreign soils into the United States. These soils contain biological matter and in particular micro fungi and other microbes. This company then bio-engineered these organisms to create “organic pesticides.” Unfortunately one worker at least is now gravely ill and company employees bragged of smuggling the soil past customs.
Lungren may be locked in a competitive race with Bill Durston, this is a seat we could take away from Republicans if this type of news gets out and catches the attention of local voters. Lungren sits as a Ranking Member on Homeland Security Subcommittee in the House. He brags of his SAFE ports act from 2006, but here is a case where he was less than enthusiastic about going to the mat for national security.
From the People’s Vanguard of Davis:
Did Congressman Lungren Ignore Potential National Security Threat Posed by AgraQuest’s Importation of Foreign Soils?
Last week, the Sacramento News and Review reported that an AgraQuest worker David Bell contracted a series of respiratory infections during his time working for the company in 1999. Now nearly nine years later, he continues to suffer from the debilitating illness.
The Vanguard raised questions about the environmental impact at the Kennedy Place location for AgraQuest. Questions were most specifically brought forth from Mr. Bell himself who informed the Vanguard that as an employee of AgraQuest he was told to dispose of waste material on a concrete culvert. The Vanguard also showed photographic evidence taken from several years later that suggests the possibility of contamination of the outside worksite.
In a follow up interview with David Bell, he warned us that the ventilation system at the 1105 Kennedy Place office building needs to be fully investigated as well due to the activities that took place in the building and the possibility that microbes ended up in the ventilation system.
During the course of the investigation into both Mr. Bell’s health and the workplace conditions, the Vanguard has learned that AgraQuest may have been shipping soil and other biological samples into the United States on commercial flights without proper licenses. Moreover, David Bell reports that employees at AgraQuest at the time of his employment bragged about sneaking a green suitcase full of dirt past U.S. customs on a flight from Chile.
Doug Haney, an advocate for human and patients’ rights, who specializes in mold and microbe exposure, reported this to Congressman Dan Lungren in November of 2007 during a meeting with Gold River Field Office Staffers Alexandria Snyder and Michelle Panos. Congressman Lungren (R-CA) is the ranking Republican member on the House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security. Interestingly enough, in 2006 he co-authored the SAFE Act (Security and Freedom Enhancement Act) with Congresswoman Jane Harman (D-CA), a bill that was designed to improve security at U.S. ports.
Despite warnings about the possible implications from such lax customs handling in our war on terrorism, it appears at least from Mr. Haney’s viewpoint that neither Congressman Lungren nor his staff followed through on these warnings.