I’m rather surprised about the first lawsuit to come out of the
San Francisco sewage sludge giveaway program. After the city gave away
its hazardous sludge to gardeners, calling it “organic biosolids
compost,” you’d think that the city itself (or its Public Utilities
Commission – SFPUC for short – might be the subject of a lawsuit). But
instead it’s the Vice President of the SFPUC, Francesca Vietor, who is
suing The Guardian (a UK newspaper) for libel due to their
reporting of the story.

As you may know, I’m familiar with the story. Here’s my own fact
check of the supposedly libelous article (below).

Title: “Top US healthy-eating chef Alice Waters attacked for
supporting fertiliser made of sewage that activists say contains
toxins”
TRUE

Alice Waters, the California chef who helped turn
Americans on to seasonal, local and cage-free food, is under attack from
some of her own followers who say she has championed fertiliser made of
sewage.

TRUE. I think it’s true but a little bit of a stretch to say
that she has championed “fertiliser made of sewage” (unless you want to
quibble that it was sewage
sludge, not raw sewage, used in the
fertilizer). She has championed the role of the SFPUC, and
they
have championed sewage sludge as fertilizer. So has she championed
sludge herself? That all depends on your interpretation of her words.

Activists from the Organic Consumers Association
(OCA) are picketing Waters’s fabled Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley
today in protest at her failure to condem a fertiliser derived from
sewage that, they say, contains industrial chemicals and heavy metals as
well as human waste.

TRUE. Yes, the OCA protest happened. And I think this is an
accurate characterization of the reason for the protest – Waters’
“failure to condem a fertiliser derived from sewage.” That’s a much more
accurate statement than the previous sentence.

The city of San Francisco, which prides itself on
promoting greener living, had been giving away the fertiliser to home
gardeners and local schools in the name of promoting healthy eating
habits, but has now suspended the programme.

TRUE. Unless you want to contest whether the giveaways were to
promote healthy eating habits. The fliers I saw for the events were all
about being eco-friendly.

The fertiliser was made of sewage waste collected
from San Francisco and eight other cities.

FALSE. The sludge came from San Francisco and eight other
counties.

Local authorities labelled the bags as “organic
biosolids compost”, although federal government regulations say sewage
sludge cannot be used for raising produce that is then labelled as
organic.

TRUE.

The San Francisco giveaway was overseen by
Francesca Vietor, an executive of the city’s power company who also sits
on the chef’s foundation.

DEPENDS. This depends on how you interpret “overseen.” I think
Vietor wants us to believe that even though she’s Vice President of
SFPUC, she doesn’t actually know much about what goes on there regarding
the sludge giveaways or the safety of using sludge as fertilizer. The
safety issue was brought to her attention in a letter February 10, which
she is claiming she did not read (even though she responded to it).
Thus, she says the first she heard of the safety problems with using
sludge as fertilizer was an email she received in March of this year.
That said, she may have had knowledge of the giveaways themselves (or
involvement in them), even if she never questioned their safety. So is
Vietor’s suit against The Guardian based on the fact that she doesn’t
pay attention at her job and they should have known that instead of
assuming that the Vice President of an organization would oversee what
goes on there?

In a statement today, the Chez Panisse Foundation
hit back at protesters, and said: “The Foundation looks forward to
ensuring public review of the science on this matter and working with
the San Francisco Public Utilities Commissison and other relevant
stakeholders to insure that safe practices are followed.”

TRUE.

Activists argue that Waters’s stance amounts to
greenwashing. Tests from around the country have shown that city sewage
sludge routinely contains a slew of industrial and chemical toxins. The
Environmental Protection Agency, however, requires only minimal testing
on a routine basis of the sludge.

TRUE.

“It contains a myriad of toxins. Everything that
goes down the drain that is pulled out of the water ends up in this
mountain of sludge,” said John Stauber, an adviser to the Organic
Consumers Association. “They call it recycling but it’s really
greenwashing. Bagging it up and calling it organic compost and marketing
it to school gardens is a tremendous fraud.”

TRUE.

So there you go, Guardian. Next time don’t assume that people
actually
do their jobs. Just because someone is Vice President of
an organization doesn’t mean she has any clue what the people under her
are doing or whether their actions are harming the environment or
public health.