ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENTS REQUIRED

The Draft Minutes from the last CPAC meeting have come out and this is why I am pleased that there are at least three separate individuals taking notes during these three hour meetings.

Firstly Josef of Chemtura spoke to CPAC about how his company are working towards responsible care reverification. Reality Check required here. They've been verified before and shouldn't have been. In hindsight we found out that they had inside help. Two of the CPAC members at the time had joined the CCPA (Cnd. Chemical Producers Assoc'n). Pat Mclean wisely kept that a secret or I would have publicly torn her a new one.

Chemtura have hired Sussex to help them with their public relations. This includes a Metroline survey of 500 households in Elmira dealing with local environmental issues. Here's a hint Chemtura. Tell the unvarnished truth at least most of the time. Do exactly what you say you will do. You'll be amazed at how that will help your public relations.

The excavation of 125 drums last summer went to a depth of 3 metres versus their proposed excavation of Dioxins and DDT going to a depth of .3 metre. Is this an admission of the obvious namely that under gravity liquids move downwards through the earth? Why do Chemtura/CRA try to suspend commonsense and reality when they are saving a buck? Man up and tell the truth.

Ms. Shaw of the M.O.E. advised CPAC that Mr. Metzger, the hydrogeologist working for Elmira Pump on the Union St. site of the former Varnicolor Chemical, advised her that he didn't want to share Elmira Pump's remediation plan with CPAC as they felt it wasn't part of CPAC's mandate. Really? Well he and she are both wrong! CPAC's mandate is to get the Elmira drinking water aquifers restored by 2028. The last I looked Union St. and Howard St. are both within Elmira. Old style thinking was that a company could do what they wanted on their own property. Unfortunately when you buy a grossly contaminated site that has contaminated multiple aquifers due to intentional dumping twenty plus years ago, your cleanup of OUR aquifers is public business.

Pg. 10 of the Minutes missed the best part of the Ron Campbell/Steve Quigley (CRA) interchange. Ron threw out the line, Steve grabbed it, ran with it and then Ron set the hook and reeled him in. This is in relation to alleged bio-monitoring on the Chemtura site showing no effect from GP1 & 2 discharge to the creek.

One last little shot here at the M.O.E. Steve Martindale advised CPAC that the 2028 cleanup date is based upon thirty years of Pump & Treat after the Upper Aquifer Containment System (UACS) started up. He's wrong. The UACS started in 1997 not 1998. The thirty year alleged timespan started after the Off-Site wells began pumping in the summer of 1998.