Suit by Forest Service workers says paint harmful to their health

Scott Sonner

Thursday, March 18, 1999 | 9:23 a.m.

RENO, Nev. - Past and present employees of the Forest Service are seeking a court order to stop the use of a tree-marking spray paint they say causes miscarriages and other ailments.

The lawsuit, filed last week in Washington, says the Forest Service has been breaking the law by using the specialized, all-weather paint without an environmental impact statement on possible side effects.

"Unfortunately it has taken a bunch of women getting together in the field working with the stuff to find out it is bad," said Gloria Flora, supervisor of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest in Nevada and California.

Flora isn't one of the plaintiffs, but she was concerned enough to see that the paint is no longer used in the Humboldt-Toiyabe, which stretches from Lake Tahoe across much of Nevada.

Almost a year after government scientists linked the paint to higher risks of miscarriages, birth defects and nervous system disorders, the Forest Service still hasn't provided all its employees with alternatives.

The paint has been widely used in national forests over the past 10 years to mark trees for logging. The chemicals in the paint allow it to be sprayed outdoors during freezing weather, when other paints might thicken or freeze.

In 1993, an estimated 3,000 people, 80 percent of them men, worked on crews using the paint.

A study by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health found an 82 percent to 177 percent increased risk of miscarriage among Forest Service foresters who used various brands of tree-marking paint. NIOSH also found an increased risk of birth defects when both parents were Forest Service workers.

And an April 1998 study by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration found measured exposure to the paint "appeared to be sufficient to produce central nervous system symptoms reported by the employees despite the fact the exposure levels were below OSHA's permissible limits."

Workers in Oregon and the Lake Tahoe basin said they began complaining to supervisors in the early 1990s of blurry vision, confusion, nausea, fatigue, chronic sinus irritation, headaches and diarrhea. But the lawsuit gives no figures on the incidence of these ailments.

Last year, a Forest Service worker filed her own lawsuit against the manufacturer, Niles Chemical Paint Co. of Niles, Mich.

Carla Tipton of Baker City, Ore., alleges the company knew the paint contained chemicals banned by the government, including toluene, a solvent that the state of California says is known to cause reproductive problems.

Tipton has not reported any paint-related problems herself but said she collected complaints from other employees.

At Niles Chemical, executive vice president and general counsel Sherman Drew said Wednesday he had no knowledge of the new lawsuit and had no comment. Company officials also have had no comment in the past.

Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck said last year no worker would be forced to work on crews using the oil-based paint while the agency moved toward alternatives.

The agency also persuaded forestry workers to delay their lawsuit in December, by pledging to replace the paint with a safer water-based paint by May 15.

Andy Stahl, executive director of the Association of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, a worker advocacy group based in Eugene, Ore., said the agency now has indicated it might not make the May 15 deadline.

"The Forest Service is backpedalling from the mediocre commitments they made earlier," Stahl said Wednesday from Seattle. "There has been just an unconscionable amount of foot-dragging and hand-wringing and passing of the buck on this issue."

Forest Service spokesman Joe Walsh disputed Stahl's comments.

"I don't know where he is getting that from," Walsh said from agency headquarters in Washington on Wednesday.

The agency remains on schedule to terminate all use of the old oil-based paint by May 15, Walsh said. In the meantime, "for areas where they have no choice but to use the oil-based paint, precautionary measures are being taken to protect the workers."

Flora said the problems may have gone undetected for years because it wasn't until fairly recently that women started working in the national forests.

"Guys might not discuss miscarriages or that their wife had problems getting pregnant. They'd keep quiet. But when women get together, they start comparing notes about these things."