IT'S STILL ALL ABOUT THE STROH DRAIN

I've recently been refreshing my memory regarding TAG meetings held in January and February of this year. Boy there was a significant amount of deflection and distraction going on by Lanxess and GHD. I posted here a number of articles describing those TAG meetings as well as the May 9, 2019 TAG meeting. Those postings were January 25, March 1, May 10 and 11, 2019.

Also between these TAG meetings was the April 11/19 site tour. I have already stated here that I believe that tour was a disaster for Lanxess and a big reason why TAG is currently on hold until August 1 and RAC until September 5. It is just like in the bad old days at CPAC between 2000 and 2008 when Pat Mclean would arbitrarily shut down public CPAC meetings either for her or Crompton/Chemtura's convenience. Well convenience was only part of the reason. When things, credibility wise, weren't going particularly well for the polluter they tended to space out the meetings more. This allowed greater time for the guilty parties to rethink and reshape their position and for citizen volunteers to forget the specifics and details of their criticisms and concerns.

Various suggestions and comments from Lanxess and GHD regarding the Stroh Drain, the "Gap" area, the topography and hence the final destination of past overflowing east side pits (RPE 1-5) border on the absurd. Those ridiculous, illogical and even ill conceived excuses are exactly that: excuses. Some of their suggestions regarding sampling locations are just as bad. Now if all evidence and logic points to a "sink" of dioxins/furans and DDT in area "A" then instead of actually sampling Area "A" let's instead move upgradient and test there where we think these contaminants travelled on their way to Area "A". We'll call this area "B". Or in the alternative let's move several hundred metres downstream in the Stroh Drain and test the water, sediments and creek soils there. We'll call that area "C". Therefore if we find anything untoward or suspicious at Area "B" or "C" then maybe we'll go back and take a look at Area "A" after all. This is the kind of Catch 22 gamesmanship and nonsensical logic that has plagued the Elmira cleanup for the last thirty years.