Yet the controversy on polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs1, rages on in Bloomington.
There are multiple superfund sites2 in Bloomington where hazardous PCB waste is located.
These areas were contaminated when Westinghouse3, which has now become CBS Corporation, used PCBs in the electric equipment they were manufacturing.
But that was all years ago.
After all of these years and all of this activity, the question is: Why is this still an issue?
Mr. Anonymous and civilian fracas
The most recent push for citizen action to address PCBs in Bloomington was started by a man who goes by the name of John Smith.
He has used three different names when talking to local EPA staff. Employees have taken to calling him Mr. Anonymous.
“It’s just a really disturbing thing,” he said Saturday. “The more I learned, the more upset I got. It goes really deep, and the whole thing kind of alludes to huge systematic corruption.”
He is attempting to rally community support in order to establish a non-governmental third party to monitor the cleanup process, increase government data transparency and remove what he feels are unnecessary chemicals from the Bloomington Water Utility Plant.
“It seems that the EPA protects industry, industry took a giant toxic shit in our town and the Bloomington Government was negligent and is still concealing their own potential liability and lack of responsibility,” he wrote in a document that was provided to the Indiana Daily Student at a local meeting.
On March 7, a group of about 30 people gathered to discuss the cleanup efforts. This past Saturday, a smaller group gathered at the Monroe County Public Library to hear Mick Harrison speak. Harrison, a Bloomington attorney dedicated to protecting whistle blowers, has spent 31 years working on the local PCB problem.
“As much as we love Bloomington, it does have an issue,” Harrison said. “A lot of communities have literally been poisoned by the improper disposal of chemical waste.”
Harrison represented citizens in several lawsuits regarding the improper disposal of PCBs. All suits were lost in accordance with EPA regulations.
Harrison succeeded in putting a stop to the original cleanup plan that involved burning the chemicals in an incinerator. Today, the chemicals are being filtered from the water and stored either in capped landfills on the Superfund sites or they have been transferred to other communities.
“I think that people are reasonable about being afraid when they’ve got thousands of pounds of PCBs in their community,” he said. “The technology is there to destroy PCBs using non-incinerating technology that changes the chemical to make it dramatically less toxic. The problem is, it’s expensive. You’d think people would be more concerned about poisoning kids than their budget.”
Not everyone at Saturday’s meeting was convinced. David Parkhurst, a professor of Environmental Science at the School of Public and Environmental Affairs, attended IU during the original rounds of testing and sees no cause for alarm.
“Even though I lived in Bloomington, my blood level was the average American blood level,” he said. “There may be a few people in Bloomington who are at risk, like the one’s who worked at the plant, but I don’t think there are very many. I feel that people are really just blowing it way out of proportion.”
Government response
Thomas Alcamo, a remedial Project Manager for the U.S. EPA, said he feels confident the cleanup effort is being handled appropriately.
“I would live next to Lemon Lane,” he said. “There’s not a problem with it. The EPA views that we’ve met the terms of all of the remedies, we’re protecting public health and we’re protecting the environment.”
He said there have been thousands of studies on PCBs in Bloomington and that he has made every effort to make those available when possible. Under the Superfund restrictions, CBS and the EPA are both required to submit regular reports on the cleanup process.
John Langley, the deputy director of Bloomington Utilities, agrees the local government, the EPA and CBS have made a good deal of effort to cooperate and solve the problem.
“This cleanup is controlled by a federal district court, and lying to them is punishable by jail,” Langley said. “Why would we do that? Why would Westinghouse do that? This Smith guy has just assumed that we’re in a conspiracy. I’m telling you that we are not near that good. It’s just ridiculous to think that we could keep a secret like that.”
Langley said new data, which they expect to be validated over the summer, will show a 95-percent reduction of PCBs in fish tissue in Clear Creek, the water source where many of the chemicals have been found.
“The state of Indiana, for the first time since 1975, is going to lift the no-eat ban for fish in the Monroe County creeks,” Langley said.
Where to go from here
Langley said there are ongoing meetings to address the contamination still present at Bennett’s Dump. Local government representatives are meeting with EPA scientists, state representatives, toxicologists and epidemiologists to plan the most effective cleanup process. Non-government entities will not be present at the meetings.
“It’s like inviting the world to your fish bowl,” Langley said. “Normally, local government isn’t even involved in Superfund projects. The only reason Bloomington gets a seat at the table is because we were the first ones to sue Westinghouse.”
Diane Henshel, a SPEA professor who has been very involved in the PCB debates, is happy to see citizens who are concerned about the state of the cleanup.
“I think it’s important for us to start an open discussion,” Henshel said. “It’s good to see citizens caring because there was a period during which it seemed like no one cared anymore. What’s important now is that the community gets accurate information.”
Henshel warns, however, that the cleanup will never be perfect.
“What happened, happened, and with Bloomington’s geography, it’s impossible to get all of the PCBs out of the bedrock,” she said. “We’ve come a hugely long way, and community members need to stay informed and continue to be active, show interest and come to meetings to help solve this problem.”
