Candidate Statement
Like many of you, I am deeply concerned and heartbroken over the news out of Ladera Ranch this past week. In a community of fewer than 30,000 people, at least six of its children have been diagnosed with Ewing sarcoma, a rare disease that accounts for roughly 1% of childhood cancers nationwide, affecting only about 200 to 240 young people in the entire country yearly. One of them, Brody Matteson, is no longer with us. He was a boy who loved being outside — on his bike, at the park. He was diagnosed in 2015 with spinal cancer.
His mother, Megan, and the other families suspect that the cancers are linked to pesticides used in their communities. Attorney Jackie French said, "[we] feel like there's a larger number of cancer cases in Ladera than normal, and in looking at the pesticide use, it does seem like it's more than normal in Ladera."
I am outraged, because what is happening in Ladera Ranch isn’t isolated. It is happening all over Southern California, including throughout District 59. Creek Team OC identified triclopyr, imazapyr, and glyphosate — the active ingredient in RoundUp — among the herbicides applied in our waterways, channels, watersheds, and creek beds. These compounds have devastating effects on wildlife, particularly endangered species like the Southern California steelhead trout, of which fewer than 177 remain. The California Department of Public Health classified glyphosate as a carcinogen. Thousands of lawsuits against Bayer over Roundup's cancer risks reached juries across this state and nation. Yet our own county agencies continued applying these compounds where our drinking water comes from, where our families live, our children play, our future grows up — and expected no one to ask questions. The science is contested, but the questions are undeniable and necessary.
In May 2026, following intense public backlash, Orange County officials temporarily paused herbicide spraying in our creeks and flood channels countywide. It is not acceptable that we have to organize mapping campaigns, document spray dates, and file public records requests just to understand what chemicals are near our children. When a county agency uses hazardous substances in or near residential areas, transparency shouldn't require activism. Accountability shouldn't require a lawsuit.
The damage from years of unchecked spraying is already done. A temporary pause is not a solution — it is a pause in a pattern, and patterns resume unless someone forces them to stop. We need a permanent limitation on herbicide applications in our creeks and flood channels – there are already examples, like San Diego County, of how these waterways can be protected while still staying viable. We need real-time public disclosure of every compound, volume, location, and date — made available to all residents, not buried in paperwork. We need a state-funded epidemiological investigation into the Ladera Ranch cancer cluster, conducted by independent researchers who answer to families, not to the agencies that approved the spraying.
These are not radical demands. They are the bare minimum a government owes to the people it serves.
Brody Matteson should be riding his bike through Ladera Ranch today. He's not. His mother Megan, and every family standing beside her, should not have to grieve and fight at the same time. That burden should never fall on parents. It should fall on the institutions that failed them and on the representatives whose job it is to hold those institutions accountable.
I'm running for State Assembly because I believe the connection between what we spray and what our children inherit cannot be ignored. We don't have to choose between maintained infrastructure and safe communities. We can have both. But it starts with honesty — and honesty has been in short supply. Every child in District 59 deserves to grow up in a community where the water is clean, the parks are safe, and the government tells the truth.
Victor Hernandez, Candidate, State Assembly – District 59
victorforassembly.com