BACKGROUND: In the March/April 2013 issue, The Next STEP newsletter (a toxics newsletter) published an article on the toxicity and demonstrated ineffectivness of community water fluoridation, the result of our impartial research on both sides of the issue. For all of March, we received only one reader email disagreeing with this article. Most reader feedback on this article has been extremely positive, finding it fair, factual, useful, and entirely appropriate for a toxics newsletter. Then on April 5, the Press Democrat (PD) wrote an article questioning the appropriateness of our article -- without even mentioning key facts about the newsletter's intent, history, and design. You can see the PD's article, my response, our original fluoridation article, more about the history and design of the newsletter, and other related information at www.healthyworld.org/SCFluoridation-APD.html.

	MY LETTER TO THE EDITOR, AS SUBMITTED (before they edited it) Dear Editor Paul Gullixson - I'm surprised that The Press Democrat has tried to unfairly malign our little community toxics education newsletter, for our article about the toxic risk of community water fluoridation. ("Sebastopol newsletter roils water on fluoride," April 5). Most people I've seen comment on our newsletter article felt that it was factual, useful and completely appropriate for our periodical. The two city officials you quoted also told me they had no issue with it, contrary to how you presented their views. However, folks who've only read your story might not realize that you unfortunately mischaracterized the nature of our periodical. The Next STEP is not a generic City of Sebastopol newsletter or a special "bulletin." "STEP" stands for "Sebastopol Toxics Education Program." This newsletter is an innovative City-community collaborative project, implemented by volunteers, to serve the City's goal of helping residents avoid toxics use and exposure. So our fluoridation article fits right in. Your story really was just based on the atypical complaints of two people -- one of whom is clearly partisan, as she previously worked for the Department of Health Services (DHS), which is pitching water fluoridation to the Supervisors. The real question then isn't why we summarized the key scientific evidence against this practice, but why DHS doesn't. I understand that fluoridation's claims are appealing, and your paper has taken an editorial stand for it. But we all have a right to see beneath the PR before this material is put into our precious water supply and environment. &endash; Patricia Dines, Editor, The Next STEP newsletter
	MY LETTER TO THE EDITOR, AS PUBLISHED (after they edited it) http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20130422/OPINION/130419419/1044/opinion02?p=all&tc=pgall Article 'fit right in' EDITOR: I'm surprised that The Press Democrat has tried to unfairly malign our little community toxics education newsletter, for our article about the toxic risk of community water fluoridation. ("Sebastopol newsletter roils waters on fluoride," April 5). Most people I've seen comment on our newsletter article felt that it was factual, useful and completely appropriate for our periodical. The two city officials you quoted also told me they had no issue with it, contrary to how you presented their views. However, folks who've only read your story might not realize that you unfortunately mischaracterized the nature of our periodical. The Next STEP is not a generic city of Sebastopol newsletter or a special "bulletin." "STEP" stands for "Sebastopol Toxics Education Program." This newsletter is an innovative city-community collaborative project, implemented by volunteers, to serve the city's goal of helping residents avoid toxics use and exposure. So our fluoridation article fits right in. Your story really was just based on the atypical complaints of two people &emdash; one of whom is clearly partisan, as she previously worked for the Department of Health Services, which is pitching water fluoridation to the supervisors. The real question then isn't why we summarized the key scientific evidence against this practice, but why health services doesn't. I understand that fluoridation's claims are appealing, and your paper has taken an editorial stand for it. But we all have a right to see beneath the public relations before this material is put into our precious water supply and environment. PATRICIA DINES Editor, [Omitted/The] Next STEP newsletter
	MY COMMENT ON THE WEB VERSION Thanks to the PD for publishing my response to this article. I do want to correct one edit the PD made that reduces the clarity of what I was saying. The letter I submitted referred to the City government as the "City of Sebastopol" and that this is a "City-community project" for a City goal. I capitalized the word City in all these cases to refer to official actions and policies of that entity. However, the PD decided to change all those references to "city", no initial capital, which could easily then make it appear that I was vaguely referring to the town itself. So I wanted to let readers know that my reference was specifically to official government decisions made. Folks can read more about the history of this cool innovative project at www.healthyworld.org/SCFluoridation-APD.html [and www.healthyworld.org/STEP-HistoryDesign.html]. Also, I don't know why the PD chose to do this; my capitalization is consistent with the journalistic style that I felt was quite standard, and I've seen the PD use in other articles (e.g. http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20130102/COMMUNITY/130109947/0/SEARCH)

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