RECENT CHEMTURA/ M.O.E. ZINGERS & HUMDINGERS

Approximately a year and a half ago citizen Susan Bryant publicly expresed her concern to the Ontario Ministry of the Environment that an aerial photograph possibly depicted some sort of pathway, or overland flow of liquids from near the highly contaminated GP1 & 2, southerly towards a family swimming pond (Martin). GP1 & 2 are on Chemtura's extreme south-east corner and allegedly were the recipients of "seepage and overflow from the east pits". They are also highly contaminated with Dioxins and DDT at a minimum. Our illustrious M.O.E. "investigated". They advised that they took soil samples from the berm around the pond as well as doing a walkaround for visual examination. They advised Susan (& CPAC) that all was well and the pond was safe and uncontaminated. They did not take sediment or other samples from the interior sides or bottom of the pond. More importantly they deflected and avoided the basic question as to whether there was or had been overland flow from Chemtura's highly contaminated south-east corner towards the Martin pond. The answer we now know is that there is a man made drain running parallel to and twenty feet away from Chemtura's property line for several hundred yards which runs southwards excruciatingly close to the Martin pond. It is also downslope from the south-east end of GP1. Thank you George Karlos and the M.O.E. for your lack of forthrightness and honesty.

I wrote down a particularly funny quote from last Thursday's CPAC meeting. It was "...the neighbour's property rights need to be respected.". I think it came from George Karlos although Mark Bauman was also on the same kick. According to that opinion it would be inappropriate to do soil sampling on the neighbour's property to determine if there was a long term repository of Dioxins/DDT which slowly are discharging downstream and negatively impacting both human beings and the environment.

Further to "...seepage and overflow from the east pits..." the story changed a little on Thursday evening. Jeff Merriman advised that he'd received information from the now deceased Harry Soehner, former Industrial Relations Manager at Uniroyal, that occasionally (annually?) they would "...open the gates to drain them (east pits).". Really? I'm not exactly sure how that somehow helps Uniroyal's image as uncaring, unthinking, dirty polluters. In fact what it does do for me is indicate that on a regular basis (annually?) there was quoting Susanna "...a tidal wave..." of water, solvents and DDT/Dioxins flowing downgradient from RPE 4 & 5. While "tidal wave" was Susanna's words she was actually attempting to suggest that there wasn't enough volume of liquids to flow through the Chemtura wetland over to the neighbouring property. While undoubtedly lots would simply soak into the ground if there was enough volume at once it could certainly flow overland.

I wonder if you tell a lie long enough, such as GP1 & 2 collected all the "seepage and overflow from the east pits"; can you actually begin to believe it? In other words if Uniroyal/Chemtura were blatantly lying twenty years ago about this; are they still blatantly lying or are they beginning to believe their own BS?