Personal Communication with Joe Conlon AMCA

August 18, 2009

Would you have an estimate for the cost of mosquito control to various counties?

Unfortunately, not really. Small counties don’t really cost anything out. They may assign dollar values, but the view is skewed. In 1999, the AMCA asked for information from mosquito abatement districts and also performed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, but received no information in response. We can’t even get information on something as simple as: do you perform larviciding?

There is some information available on counties annual reports.

I know that Lee County located in Naples, FL performs biological control. But it is a wildlife refuge. They have 27 aircrafts. Wayne Gale is a contact for them.

In California, Dave Brown is a representative for Kern County moswuito control. They have a budget of $500,000 and perform significant surveillance and IPM.

These two districts are not representative. Smaller districts just spray on a schedule basis. There is no trapping data. They have low budgets and are more like mom and pop operations.

Do you have an idea about the number of mosquito control districts or organizations?

Again no. We do have an AMCA list of mosquito abatement districts by state (see below), but we have no way of knowing if its updated or correct. There are also agencies performing mosquito control that are not included (for example counties’ departments of transits). These groups are not members of the AMCA and not included. We don’t even know the amount of pesticide being used. It’s kind of embarrassing the lack of information.

Further Personal Communication: How many counties or cities are there per district generally?

It’s hard to know. We got the list of mosquito abatement districts and agencies by querying the regional directors of the AMCA. Some places don’t even have districts. All entities are at the local level. The 734 districts (left

- side) may be counties or may not. For example, Chesapeake is a city, a large entity, but it counts as one. The local agencies (right column) are agencies at the local level, small cities or towns. These guys probably aren’t doing a lot of IPM.

It changes region to region.Midwestern places spray where there is population to merit it.

What about Alaska?In Alaska, there might be some spraying in Anchorage or Juneau. Maybe public health

departments during mosquito season. But I doubt there is much if any mosquito control going on. In the upper northwest (North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin) there is really not much mosquito control going on. In Minnesota, 1 district covers 7 counties and they do larvicide, IPM, source reduction and no adulticiding. Adulticide is performed by small towns or as a last resort. In rural areas, people generally just deal with it and live with it. For example, there is no mosquito control in Arkansas. In the more populous and wealthy states

– Florida, Virginia, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia

– there is well organized mosquito control which utilizes IPM. Southwest has very few districts. There are no districts in New Mexico or Arizona, though some may form to address a specific concern.

What about Idaho? Idaho has several districts.

What about Massachusetts? Massachustetts has active mosquito control.

And NH? I’m not aware of any districts.

How do we know if it’s a mosquito control district performing spraying or public health department? We don’t necessarily know the breakdown. Mosquito control district might require adulticiding while a public health department sees no problem and doesn’t care. Really public health only gets involved when they begin to see human cases of West Nile Virus. There are also jurisdictional issues. NOIs about spraying get waived if there’s an emergency situation, but who declares the emergency? Public health departments or mosquito abatement districts?

Conlon Joseph <conlonamcata@gmail.com>

08/18/2009 01:37 PM I've attached my listing of mosquito abatement districts and agencies.

List of Mosquito Abatement Districts & Agencies

States Districts Local Agencies Alabama 5 Alaska Arizona California 53 28 Colorado 9 Connecticut 1 statewide 1 Delaware 1 statewide 3Florida 61 287

Georgia 11 Hawaii 1 Idaho 23 Illinois 21 Indiana 9 Iowa 1 Kansas Kentucky 1 statewide 15 Louisiana 21 Maine UNK Maryland 1 statewide Massachusetts 9 Projects 192 Michigan 5 22 Minnesota 1 23 Mississippi 2 Missouri 4 41 Montana 35 Nebraska 5 Nevada 17 New Hampshire UNK New Jersey 21 New Mexico 13 New York 5 UNK North Carolina 1 85 North Dakota 2 9 Ohio 107 Oklahoma 1 Oregon 18 Pennsylvania 6 67 Rhode Island 1 statewide South Carolina 15 185 South Dakota 4 Tennessee 1 Texas 8 39 Utah 23 Vermont 3 Virginia 15 Washington 16 West Virginia Wisconsin 1 Wyoming 3

734 1105