EPA not talking to media about Asarco cleanup

[seemslikeadream]

By EVE BYRON - IR Staff Writer

Montana EPA director ‘baffled' by regional office's response

The woman now overseeing on-site cleanup work at the East Helena Asarco plant refused to comment to the media about the work Wednesday night, saying that she's not allowed to talk to the press.

Linda Jacobson, who works out of the regional Environmental Protection Agency's office in Denver, recently took charge of the East Helena on-site remediation efforts, including the monitoring of an underground arsenic plume that has migrated off of the site.

But in the past few weeks, she hasn't returned repeated calls from the Independent Record regarding test results on wells installed to monitor the plume's movement and on Wednesday night referred calls to the EPA's attorney's office.

"I can't talk to you," Jacobson said. "I'm sorry I didn't have someone call you back. I'll have our attorney call you."


That stance is consistent with what's being called a "gag order" memo recently put out by a couple of the EPA's regional offices. In an Aug. 31 e-mail sent to EPA Region VIII employees — which includes Colorado and Montana — officials warned staff that if an inquiry from the press seemed partisan, they were to respond "no comment," according to a federal whistleblower protection group.
more
http://www.helenair.com/articles/2004/10/15/helena/a08101504_01.txt

EPA needs to remove the gag

By The Helena IR - 10/17/04

Somebody, either from on high in Washington, D.C., or on the regional level, has slapped a gag order on a couple of regional Environmental Protection Agency offices, thereby sullying the agency's professionalism and doing damage to the public's right to know.

In Denver-based EPA Region VIII, which includes Montana, a recent memo ordered staffers to respond with "no comment" if they thought a news reporter's questions seemed partisan. A memo from the agency's Great Lakes region went even further, saying employees should refrain from answering any questions from journalists, leaving it to the EPA's Office of Public Affairs to decide how to respond.

We first learned of these gag orders last week when IR staff writer Eve Byron got the runaround from the Denver EPA employee in charge of clean-up work at the East Helena Asarco plant. Byron wanted to report the latest test-well results regarding an underground arsenic plume migrating off the site. Sorry, said the EPA staffer, but I can't talk to the press.


That's in complete contrast to the Montana EPA's practice of being open to the press and making the most knowledgeable employees available to explain the details of their work.

In a hot election season, we can understand how an agency might want to steer clear of political hot potatoes. But whatever the political ramifications, the EPA scientists, administrators and other professionals at work on the ground have a duty not only to the success of their projects, but to keep affected citizens informed. To assume these professionals can't do that is a slap in their faces.

more
http://www.helenair.com/articles/2004/10/17/opinions_top/a04101704_01.txt

[acmavm]

1. Hmmm. Asarco left a terrible mess here in Omaha as well. ConAgra

built a campus on the site and the citizens of Omaha had to pay to have all new dirt shipped in.

The way the fixed the ground pollution was by putting a plastic cover over the ground and then piling dirt on it. Of course the problem there was (is) that tree roots, etc. can puncture the plastic and then goodbye fix. Since that was about 20+ years ago, I imagine it's already happened.

The really bad thing was this battery plant was right on the Missouri River. And the EPA had to do a lot of clean up in people's yards for literally MILES. And they still didn't get it all.

ASARCO is one of those companies that got away with murder in the pollution department.

[NC_Nurse]

2. When I testified at the EPA hearing about

the Bush admin's attempt to relax the Clean Air Act standards for power companies - letting them let more mercury into the environment that ends up in our rivers, streams and therefore diets...an EPA employee told me that he was demoralized by what this admin has done to the EPA and the environmental protections. He said that all his fellow EPA employees went into the field to help conserve and preserve the environment and protect public health...but the politics of this admin has left them powerless and disgusted.


:(

[Octafish]

3. You'd think EPA would want to warn America about an ARSENIC PLUME.

Gee. It's only poison.

[seemslikeadream]

4. WHEN BUSH LIES OUR PLANET DIES

http://www.bushflash.com/sp.html


Smothered Hope

withered rope you hang what's empty can't remain to put it simply
in time cry the hollow words to sing with false disguise
smothered hope fly from sorrow for a new divine tomorrow
i just don't want to know anymore
life shifts up and down everybody knows it's wrong
why don't you care? now do it seem fair?
it's not in the rhyme or reason
so it goes with every season crawl to top fall through bottom
first hand love is really rotten
slice of life find what's plenty inch towards a sanctuary
light with me inside the womb
i know everyone everybody knows it's me
it's my voice, my voice cries out obscenity
sightless eye regard my past sometimes it should
i just don't want to know anymore.

SKINNY PUPPY

:hi:

[Octafish]

5. Chimpageddon

One way or another, the Smirk is doing his lord's work. Too bad the voices in his small head aren't the Good Lord's.

Really like the poem, slad-san!