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By Stacie Crozier

San Diego—A unanimous vote by the San Diego City Council June 10 authorized negotiations for initiating community water fluoridation in the largest non-fluoridated city in the U.S. by 2010.

"We are thrilled that the San Diego City Council unanimously accepted grant funds from the First 5 San Diego Commission to construct and operate community water fluoridation at its three treatment plants," said Jon R. Roth, executive director of the California Dental Association Foundation. "This was a pinnacle step in a long journey to bring the benefits of fluoridation to the largest U.S. city where it had been absent."

In an unrelated action, the First 5 Commission also selected the CDA Foundation to manage the implementation of its community water fluoridation program.

"We look forward to working with San Diego City and the other county water agencies to round out fluoridation in Southern California," Mr. Roth added.

Following more than two hours of testimony from proponents and opponents and deliberation, the city council voted to accept $3.9 million in funding from the First 5 Commission of San Diego to add fluoridation equipment to the city's three water treatment plants. The council gave Mayor Jerry Sanders the go-ahead to negotiate and execute a contract and begin implementation, a process expected to take up to two years.

Dr. Howard Pollick, clinical professor, University of California at San Francisco School of Dentistry and an ADA fluoridation spokesperson, responded to questions posed by City Council members about the science and public health aspects of fluoridation.

"I was fully prepared to answer those questions and glad to have played a small role in getting to the more than a million residents of the city of San Diego the benefits of fluoridation and reduce the level of tooth decay for adults as well as children," Dr. Pollick said. "Congratulations to the many, many individuals who testified at the hearing and for their dedicated hard work over the past dozen or so years."

California state law requires cities with 10,000 or more water customers to fluoridate drinking water if they receive funding from an outside agency.

The First 5 Commission allocates the county's Proposition 10 funds to help promote the health and well being of children age 5 and younger and to ensure that every young child in San Diego county receives the support needed to enter kindergarten ready to learn.

California's Proposition 10, passed by voters in 1998, established a 50-cent-per-pack tax on tobacco products and generates some $700 million a year to be invested in the healthy development of California children from prenatal to age 5.

In late 2007, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California began fluoridating the drinking water it supplies to 18 million customers from 26 cities and water agencies, including about nine percent of San Diego—the single largest expansion of fluoridation in the U.S.