Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! We’ll be focused on blog maintenance for the next week or so (mostly getting things back in working order since the migration). Then we plan to resume a regular posting schedule beginning just after the New Year. Thanks for your continued interest and support.
We’re now officially live on our new blog host. Thanks to Annette and her team for tremendous help with the migration. Since we’re also on a new platform, we’ve temporarily lost some of the old features and links, but will add them back asap. Before we’re back to 100%, if you need anything in a pinch and can’t find it, feel free to drop us a note at tceblog[at]gmail.com. Thanks.
We will be migrating this blog to a new platform/host over the next few days or so. Please bear with us as we iron out the kinks. Thank you for your understanding.
Residents, organized as a group called the Behr VOC Area Leaders (BVOCAL), have released the following documentary on YouTube called “This our Neighborhood”:
The documentary details the history of the TCE contamination from the Behr Dayton Thermal Plant in the the McCook Field neighborhood in Dayton, OH.
In today’s news, residents are asking EPA for new widespread testing of indoor air in the neighborhood to rule out risks of exposure by vapor intrusion. So far, EPA has not agreed to the testing. In what appears to be yet another dubious, knee-jerk, party-line denial from federal agencies, Stacey Coburn, the U.S. EPA’s project manager for the site, has stated that “she doesn’t believe anyone’s health is at risk from the plume” despite reports of nearby groundwater contamination levels exceeding 900ppb of TCE and previous confirmation that dangerous levels of TCE have already poisoned indoor air in certain homes.
Meantime, a lawsuit has been filed on behalf of the contaminated community who apparently disagree with EPA’s empty reassurances.
The latest novel from Nashville mystery writer Chester D. Cambell is set against the backdrop of TCE contamination:
The Surest Poison
The first book in the new Sid Chance Mysteries
Three seemingly unrelated murders crop up during the investigation of a decade-old chemical dump that plagues a rural community west of Nashville. PI Sid Chance, a former National Parks ranger whose career as a small town police chief was cut short by malicious accusations of bribery, pursues the case after being coaxed out of self-imposed exile by Jaz LeMieux, a wealthy ex-cop.
Is the man responsible for the pollution dead or alive? Who is having Sid tailed and threatened? When Jaz helps with the investigation, she is awakened by an explosion behind her mansion. Is it related to the abduction of her housekeepers’ grandson, or Sid’s case? As the tension mounts, Sid finds himself confronting the unsavory people responsible for his past troubles.
You can read a review of the book here. Or order it from Amazon.
(UPDATE: Though we’ve not yet had a chance to review it, here is a PDF copy of the official complaint – not yet including exhibits.)
(UPDATE II: Complaint now also available for download with exhibits)
While we’re working to obtain a copy of the official complaint, here’s what we know so far:
On July 4, 2009, Laura J. Jones, through her attorneys, filed a lawsuit against the the federal government claiming that her health problems, including non-hodgkins lymphoma, resulted from toxic water at Camp Lejeune. A nice touch, we think, filing suit against the government on Independence Day.
The suit was filed under authority of the Federal Tort Claims Act. The act allows citizens to sue the federal government in court for money based on “personal injury or death caused by caused by the negligent or wrongful act or omission of any employee of the Government.” (28 U.S.C.A. § 1346(b))
The official title of the case is Laura J. Jones v. United States of America, case number 7:2009cv00106 7:09-cv-00106-BO.
The case was filed in the Eastern District Court of North Carolina and was assigned to Judge Terrence W. Boyle.
The case is filed on behalf of Jones as a single plaintiff with additional cases expected to be filed in the future. No news on whether a class action filing is expected.
According to a news report from NBC17 in North Carolina:
The suit says the government knew for at least five years that chemicals such as tetrachloroethylene, trichloroethylene, dicloroethylene, vinyl chloride and benzene contaminated the water supply in high doses, but let the wells stay open.
Lawyers say the toxic water led to cancer and other health problems.
[...]
The suit contends that if the military had followed its own regulations that had been in place since the 1950s, the contamination would not have happened.
According to a CBS News 9 report, Jones lived on the base from 1980 to 1983 and was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma 20 years later.
Jones’s case will rely, in part, on military documents that outline the military’s policy for maintaining a safe water supply.
Jones currently lives in Iowa and suffers from fibromyalgia and immune disorders. She was not well enough to attend the Monday’s press conference announcing the lawsuit.
Below is a video containing excerpts from the press conference, provided courtesy of NBC17:
Trento’s Take: Is Obama Putting Lipstick On The Pentagon’s Toxic Pig?
Written by Joseph Trento
Monday, 06 July 2009
For those who think the Obama Administration may be too cozy with corporate interests, there are some disturbing hints that validate this theory that go beyond economic policies.
Such hints can be found in how the Obama White House has treated chemical companies that have endangered the health of millions of Americans with toxins and chemicals left behind by military contractors—including service members and their spouses and children.
[...]
In fact, the Obama Administration has invited into the White House the very chemical companies that have been exposing Americans, including the military and their families, to toxins and chemicals that kill and destroy lives. These chemicals seep into water supplies in and around military bases. TCE and perchlorate are just two. There are many more.
By delaying the EPA’s establishment of interim public health standards, the Pentagon ensures that local governments have no way of setting a safety standard to protect the air, water, and health of those who live in communities that are affected.
Adam Sarvana’s stories on “Poisoned Patriots” and Ray DuBois on DCBureau.org are the tip of a worldwide scandal of Pentagon pollution and a corporate/government partnership to delay and confuse the public while their health suffers and the pollution is not cleaned up.
The Obama White House should shut down the Pentagon’s Chemical and Material Risk Management Directorate and give that budget to the EPA so they can independently supervise the cleanup of the Pentagon’s toxic legacy. Further, President Obama would be wise to reveal who is secretly meeting at the White House with chemical company lobbyists, instead of keeping secret White House visitor logs. Americans are entitled to know which chemical company representatives have lobbied OMB and the Administration as well as the identity of the other “stakeholders” on the White House invitation list. That is change we can believe in.
What is at stake? Further delays prevent local authorities from protecting their citizens and the EPA from dealing with one of the biggest polluters in the world—the United States Department of Defense.
MA Members- From LagoonVet: I’m looking for former Marines living in Massachusetts who are affected by the contaminated water at Lejeune. I was stationed aboard Lejeune from 85 to 89. I lived in Tarawa Terrace base housing from 1985 to 1986. I remember several families from Mass. that lived in the same area I lived in, so I know you’re out there. We need to get together to pressure our Congressional delegates to act on our behalf. Together we stand and they know it. If there are 2,180 former Marines registered from Massachusetts then we need to form it up and sound off. Let’s begin the contact process and start communication by posting on the discussion board first then we can take it from there. We need to do this now. Please see my thread on TFTPTF http://tftptf.com/v-web/bulletin/bb/viewtopic.php?t=422 or send me an email through the website. -LagoonVet
IA Members- From Terri & Jon: We are looking for any Marines or their families that live in Iowa. Please contact one of the following individuals: Terri Huntley at tllhuntley@yahoo.com or Jon Tory at faba2th@msn.com. Please see our thread on the TFTPTF bulletin board at http://tftptf.com/v-web/bulletin/bb/viewtopic.php?t=421 -Terri & Jon
A day-long meeting was held on June 26, 2009 in Washington, DC for a day-long meeting to launch this exciting stakeholder and public involvement initiative. Keynote speakers will include U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson, and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Director Dr. Linda Birnbaum. Breakout sessions allowed for discussion of specific issues related to public health and chemical exposures.
The 18 month long National Conversation will offer many opportunities for involvement, including: expert working groups, regional and local face-to-face public meetings, and web-based discussions. The resulting action agenda will outline steps for NCEH/ATSDR and other institutions to take to better protect public health from harmful chemical exposures.
Due to scheduling conflicts, we were unable to attend the kick-off meeting but we’re very interested in this initiative and will try to keep readers posted on developments here.
Did you participate in the kick-off of this “conversation?” If so, we’d like to hear from you. Please share your thoughts in the comments or privately at tceblog[at]gmail.com.
As reported in the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle:
The Rochester Board of Education has scheduled a special session to question state health and environmental officials about a factory-turned-schoolhouse whose owner has asked that it be declared a brownfield.
Board President Malik Evans stressed that the purpose of the meeting, slated for July 14 at 6 p.m. at the board’s downtown headquarters, is to learn more about the toxins at the site and not to take action on the Rochester School District’s future use of the building.
The district last year signed a 15-year lease on the building at 690 St. Paul St. [map], a former Bausch & Lomb factory, where it temporarily housed School 33 this school year and plans to have School 14 and the new Dr. Walter Cooper Academy share space for the next few years.
Evans said the board was unaware of any contamination concerns when it authorized the lease, noting that the site hosted a charter school between 2000 and 2005.
[...]
Word of the meeting comes two weeks after the board rejected by a vote of 5-to-2 a motion that sought to pull students out of the space immediately and stop the two schools from moving in this fall.
[...]
Environmental tests of the site conducted last summer revealed traces of trichloroethene [a/k/a Trichloroethylene] in the air, soil and groundwater.
Nearly five years after toxic chemicals were found moving toward a middle school, the company causing the contamination has a plan to clean it up.
Wayne Metal Protection, 1511 Wabash Ave. [see map], reported polluting the soil and groundwater to Indiana’s voluntary cleanup program in the fall of 2004, but consistently missed state deadlines for investigating the extent of the contamination and forming a cleanup plan. The metal-plating company sits a few hundred feet away – and uphill – from Memorial Park Middle School, and the plume of contamination extends toward the school.
[...]
Decades of metal coating at the site have left the soil and groundwater contaminated with chlorinated solvents, which move easily in groundwater and then evaporate as a gas up through the soil.
The chemicals Wayne Metal Protection found in the soil and groundwater – tetrachloroethylene and trichloroethylene – have been linked to numerous health problems including spontaneous abortions, menstrual disorders, altered sperm structure and reduced fertility, miscarriages and developmental problems. They have also been connected to kidney and liver problems, can affect the nervous and immune systems and have been linked to kidney, liver and cervical cancer, according to the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
In addition, the company later reported it had found cyanide, arsenic, lead and chromium at the site, as well as vinyl chloride, which is so dangerous the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says there is no safe level of exposure.
Though the firm has submitted a plan, it will still need technical review by IDEM and a public comment period, a process that could take several more months.
Clark v. United States, 660 F. Supp. 1164 (1987), summarizes mid-1900’s knowledge of TCE’s danger, unfitness for consumption, and the need to prevent it from poisoning water supplies:
Prior to 1950, [TCE] was known as dangerous and poisonous in occupational settings involving sustained exposure to high concentrations of TCE, but specific adverse health effects resulting from chronic exposure were not generally understood. Prior to 1950 it was generally known that TCE was not fit to consume and that it should not be in a water supply. The defendant [Air Force] was or should have been aware that substances such as TCE should not be in a water supply.
[...]
Prior to 1950, it was common knowledge that groundwater could be polluted and that the pollution could travel great distances from the site of the original contamination. Further, it was generally known prior to that time that percolation, a process by which substances disposed of would leach into the underlying groundwater, could occur and that groundwater needed to be protected from deleterious leachates.
The appropriate standard of care in waste disposal in the 1950s was to treat TCE as a hazardous substance in disposing of the contaminant so as not to pollute groundwater.
Scientists studying drinking water contamination at Camp Lejeune were startled when 11 men with breast cancer and ties to the North Carolina base were identified over the last two years.
Six more have been found in one week.
Five additional men with breast cancer and a sixth who had a double mastectomy after doctors found precancerous tumors contacted the St. Petersburg Times last week after reading a story about the 11 men with the rare disease.
“This male breast cancer cluster is a smoking gun,” breast cancer survivor Mike Partain said on Friday. “You just can’t ignore it. You don’t need science to tell you something is wrong. It’s common sense. It begs to be studied.”
[...]
Male breast cancer is exceedingly rare. Just 1,900 men are expected to be diagnosed with breast cancer this year compared with nearly 200,000 women, the American Cancer Society says.
A man has a 1-in-1,000 lifetime chance of getting the disease.
Men who get it are often over 70, though it is rare even in older males. Of the 17 men identified by Partain and the Times, just three are over 70 — the youngest was Partain at 39 — and many have no family history of breast cancer, male or female, according to interviews.
[...]
If you or a family member lived at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina and have been diagnosed with male breast cancer, the St. Petersburg Times is interested in talking to you. Please call reporter William R. Levesque at (813) 269-5306 or toll-free at 1-800-333-7505, ext. 5306.
Anyone who lived or worked at Camp Lejeune in 1987 or before can register with the Marine Corps for a health survey. To register or to get more information, visit https://clnr.hqi.usmc.mil/clwater/ or call (877) 261-9782.
Partain’s comment refers to a highly-questionable report proffered recently by the National Academy of Sciences which ignored significant available evidence and reached suspiciously preposterous conclusions including, amongst others, that further study of the poisoned population at Camp Lejeune should be both limited and discounted.
For over a year now, McDowell County’s Omar McCourry has been digging into the history of Old Fort industry and of environmental protection in the community.
Spurred by the tragic death of his brother, Curtis, to brain cancer in 2004, he learned that his brother’s illness was not unique in Old Fort, despite the condition’s relative rarity among the greater population.
Word of mouth led him to suspect that an alarming number of folks in Old Fort had succumbed to the same illness. He has been lobbying public health officials to investigate ever since.
[...]
In 1989, more than 100 barrels of industrial waste were located buried on the site of the former Old Fort Finishing. These were excavated and found to contain dozens of chemicals as well as metals including lead, mercury, arsenic. EPA documents McCourry obtained said that 70 of the barrels had been crushed or decayed when they were unearthed.
The article notes that residential well water samples have detected TCE and PCE at levels exceeding federal safety thresholds for at least 20 years. The article fails to mention that scientists and health agencies worldwide have long-since established that TCE and PCE are neurotoxic and cause cancer.
Not only do local health officials appear typically disinterested, but a local Senator has decided to participate in what feels like an ongoing, nationwide charade:
As McCourry had been told when he brought his findings to the attention of state authorities, in any given population group, if they live long enough, a great number of them would be diagnosed with cancer. It is very difficult, they said, to identify a “cluster” of cancer cases that might indicate a pattern, or implicate an environmental toxin.
Senator Joe Sam Queen echoed that theme in his comments to The McDowell News.
“Cancer is a condition that touches every family eventually,” he said. “We are all interested in a situation that may involve or jeopardize the health of children.
Translation: People die, suck it up.
The Senator’s comment is one that we hear frequently, and it remains a transparent excuse for inaction. The Senator and local/state health officials should give this matter the attention it deserves rather than idly hiding behind their stuff happens party line.
This just in. We’re getting more details, will have update next week:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE — LAWSUIT TO BE FILED REGARDING CAMP LEJEUNE WATER CONTAMINATION
The law offices of Anderson Pangia & Associates, PLLC (offices in Washington, D.C. and Winston Salem, North Carolina) and Smorto, Persio, Webb & McGill (of Ebensburg, Pennsylvania), will file on Monday July 6 a lawsuit arising from the toxic drinking water contamination at Camp Lejeune. The lawsuit alleges that the United States Government, through agents within the Department of Defense, knowingly exposed hundreds of thousands of Marines, sailors, their family members, and civilian employees to highly contaminated drinking water on the base at Camp Lejeune, while at the same time actively disseminating disinformation to those exposed in an effort to minimize the significance of the exposure.
The complaint, to be filed in federal court in the Eastern District of North Carolina, attaches numerous documentary exhibits in support of its allegations that the government knowingly, recklessly and/or negligently violated its own standards, rules and regulations by permitting the exposure to continue after the government was specifically warned the drinking water was “highly contaminated with . . . solvents!” and advised that “these appear[] to be at high levels and hence more important from a health standpoint. . . ” The lawsuit will allege that the Department of the Navy had regulations in place as early as 1963 which prohibited the contamination and which would have averted it had those regulations been obeyed; subsequently in 1974 the Commanding General of Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina put in place additional regulations governing the proper disposal of the very same chemicals which were discovered later to be contaminating the drinking water; had these regulations been obeyed, the contamination likewise would have been prevented. This same 1974 base order declared these “organic solvents” to be hazardous, the lawsuit states.
Many scientists have called the drinking water contamination at Camp Lejeune the worst in the nation’s history. The contaminated drinking water was consumed by an estimated one million people.
The lawsuit will allege that exposure to the toxins caused numerous health problems including cancers, reproductive disorders and birth defects, among other maladies.
Joseph Anderson, Michael Pangia and Kevin Persio, the lawyers responsible for filing the suit, will answer questions of the media at a press conference to be held in front of the North Carolina State Capitol building, 1 East Edenton St. Raleigh, NC 27601 at 1:30 p.m. on Monday July 6, 2009. Call (336) 414-7958 for more information.
We received this statement by email Wed evening (emphasis ours):
Statement in response to National Research Council report on Camp Lejeune:
We are disappointed and dismayed at the report titled, “Contaminated Water Supplies at Camp Lejeune – Assessing Potential Health Effects,” released by the National Research Council (NRC) on Saturday, June 13, 2009. This report was two years in preparation by scientists, many of whom we know and respect, that reached puzzling and in some cases erroneous conclusions. We are aware of the complex situation regarding availability and access to data, and each of us has participated in committees advising the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) about how to move forward with health studies. It is our view that the Marines and their families who were exposed to dangerous chemicals in the Camp Lejeune drinking water over several decades deserve to know if this exposure has had an effect on their health. The most direct way to assess this is to conduct valid epidemiologic studies of those who lived or worked there, and we urge ATSDR to continue their efforts to carry these to conclusion. The overall judgment about the impact of the chemicals on health can then be informed both by the general scientific literature the NRC reviewed, plus findings from directly relevant studies of the exposed population.
Specific areas where we disagree with the NRC report include their assessment of the water distribution modeling, their assessment of the risk caused by exposure to two of the principal contaminants (TCE and PCE), and the likelihood of conducting meaningful epidemiologic studies in this setting. We view the water modeling undertaken by ATSDR and its consultants as “state-of-the-art” and worth carrying through to completion so that it can be used in the on-going and proposed health studies. There may be uncertainties about specific levels of exposure for individual households or people, but these can be described in the study results. We also agree with the National Toxicology Program that TCE and PCE are “reasonably anticipated to be human carcinogens” and reject the characterization of the evidence as “limited/suggestive” as presented in the NRC report. We note that this characterization of solvent mixtures actually steps back from previous work done by the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine in 2003. Finally, we disagree with the thrust of the NRC report that it is unlikely that scientifically informative epidemiologic studies of the Camp Lejeune population can be done. The NRC doubts that “definitive” answers can come from any study, but this sets the bar too high – no one study can provide definitive answers, and all studies must be considered in the light of other scientific evidence. From our experience in other settings, we believe that useful studies of the Camp Lejeune population are possible and furthermore that the Marines and their families deserve our government’s best efforts to carry them out.
For these reasons, we urge the ATSDR to consider this particular NRC report in the context of other expert advice they have received during the past decade and the competent work already done by agency staff. Since the NRC report is at such variance with the recommendations of other water modeling and epidemiologic experts, we believe it should not stand as the final word.
Sincerely,
Ann Aschengrau, Sc.D., Professor, Associate Chair of the Department of Epidemiology, Boston University School of Public Health
Richard Clapp, D.Sc., MPH, Professor, Boston University School of Public Health
David Ozonoff, MD, MPH, Professor and Chair Emeritus of the Department of Environmental Health, Boston University School of Public Health
Daniel Wartenberg, Ph.D., Professor, Environmental and Occupational Medicine, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
Senator Burr’s office issued the following press release Wednesday:
From: Smith, Samantha (Burr)
Sent: Wed Jun 17 17:49:09 2009
Subject: Senator Burr Presses on Camp Lejeune Water Contamination at Hearing
Burr Presses on Camp Lejeune Water Contamination at Hearing
Burr questions Navy on NAS report
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
CONTACT:
David Ward
Samantha Smith
Phone:(202) 228-1616
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support held a hearing on military construction and environmental initiatives. U.S. Senator Richard Burr (R-North Carolina), Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, raised concerns about the recent National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report on water contamination at Camp Lejeune and pressed the Navy for answers.
“It’s clear that the water at Camp Lejeune was contaminated by a number of hazardous chemicals at unsafe levels,” Senator Burr said. “I am deeply concerned about the conclusions in the report from the National Academy of Sciences. This latest report still raises more questions than it answers.”
The NAS panel report, released on Saturday, concludes the water systems at Camp Lejeune were in some cases highly contaminated by two hazardous chemicals, although the NAS also stated that it could not say for sure whether the people exposed to these chemicals may have suffered adverse health outcomes as a result. The report lists fourteen diseases and health conditions that may have a link with human exposure to the chemicals indentified in the Camp Lejeune water system.
In addition to questions at today’s hearing, Senator Burr has written a letter to the Secretary of the Navy seeking answers to additional, detailed questions.
“I will continue to seek additional answers from the Department of the Navy, and I also intend to seek further input from the scientific community,” Burr said. “Former Marines, their families, and former employees at Camp Lejeune have waited far too long for answers, and we need to start working toward a resolution.
The following press release was issued yesterday (emphasis ours):
HAGAN WANTS A CONCLUSION TO THE ONGOING CAMP LEJEUNE WATER CONTAMINATION ISSUE
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. – US Senator Kay R. Hagan (D-NC) issued the following statement reacting to a new National Academy of Sciences (NAS) study on water contamination at Camp Lejeune. The study, released Saturday, concludes that while there was water contamination at the Jacksonville Marine base, additional research is “unlikely to determine conclusively whether Camp Lejeune residents were adversely affected by exposure to water contaminants.” Hagan, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has been very active in working to determine whether the Navy and Marine Corps should have handled water contamination at Camp Lejeune differently.
“The NAS study released Saturday is simply a review of previous scientific literature on hydrocarbon solvents, reports on Camp Lejeune water contamination, and published epidemiologic and toxicological studies,” said Hagan. “However, it failed to take into account the conclusions of previous epidemiological studies that found an association between volatile organic compounds (VOCs) exposures and childhood leukemia, and presents some direct contradictions to the EPA’s maximum containment levels of VOCs in drinking water. Moreover, the NAS study barely mentioned benzene and vinyl chloride and severely downplays the established links between adverse health effects and exposure to VOCs that were present in the water at Camp Lejeune. For these reasons, I cannot stand behind the validity of the NAS study.
The NAS study neglected to address key historical documents, also omitted in previous studies, regarding verified high levels of benzene found in an operating well on July 6, 1984 in the Hadnot Point water system and the 1979 leak of 20,000-30,000 of fuel at the near-by Hadnot Point fuel farm.
“The resolution of this issue cannot be held hostage to additional scientific studies that may not tell us anything more than we already know. The time has come for Congress, the Department of the Navy, and the Marine Corps to work together to develop a plan to resolve the longstanding issue of water contamination at Camp Lejeune. We already know that exposure to VOCs in drinking water is linked to adverse health effects,” Hagan continued. “While it is important that we allow the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry to complete its water modeling simulation and pending epidemiological studies for personnel and residents affected at Camp Lejeune, ongoing work on these simulations and studies need not foreclose action by Congress and the administration to reach an appropriate resolution.”
Last week, Hagan sent a letter to the Navy along with Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) asking 14 detailed questions to determine if there was prior knowledge of TCE (trichloroethylene), PCE (perchloroethylene), benzene, and vinyl chloride in the water supply before the wells were shut down. The Navy and Marines Corps have until June 25th to respond. Hagan and Burr plan to meet with the Navy Secretary Ray Mabus to address these questions and the conclusions of the NAS study before August.
The Walt Disney Co. has been sued by several groups of plaintiffs for dumping wastewater and contaminating Polliwog Park and the surrounding area with Chromium 6, TCE, and PCE.
As their attorneys shuffle between four similar lawsuits that allege the Walt Disney Co. has for decades contaminated groundwater with cancer-causing chromium 6 and other toxic chemicals, stories of ill health from the plaintiffs are beginning to emerge.
In the latest lawsuit, filed last week in Los Angeles Superior Court by the Sacramento-based firm Kershaw Cutter & Ratinoff LLP on behalf of 16 people with strong ties to the Rancho District, the plaintiffs claim Disney dumped wastewater contaminated with hexavalent chromium from its on-site cooling systems down the centerline of Parkside Avenue, toward Parish Place and across Riverside Drive into the so-called Polliwog, an 11-acre parcel near the studio’s Imagineering facilities.
“The water, without warning, would rush down like a flood,” said resident Bob Bell, who in 1945 paid $25,000 for his home at the corner of Parkside Avenue. “Water hopped the curb and flooded the streets for hours on end.”
The contamination was recently brought to light by Environmental World Watch, a party to one of the lawsuits. EWW claims that Disney has dumped air cooling water and the chemicals into curbside drains every day for the past 21 years.
Plaintiffs are seeking compensation for property damage caused by the contamination. No word yet whether any personal injury claims have been filed.