[CPEO-BIF] Vestal - another NY vapor intrusion site

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Pollution seeps under portion of Parkway

DEC to test 10-20 properties near site of former electronics firm

BY TOM WILBER
Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin (NY)
August 2, 2005 


VESTAL -- Pollution from a former electronics firm on Vestal Parkway is
flowing under the four-lane boulevard and a pedestrian walkway, and
entering basements about a half-mile away, according to a recent
state-funded investigation. 

The discovery, in two homes on King Street, illustrates the problem that
health and environmental officials face in keeping up with industrial
solvents that are forming gases and spreading into properties adjacent
to industrial sites throughout the Southern Tier. 

...

The chemicals in Vestal are flowing from the former Hidden Valley
Electronics, now a plaza that houses American Family Fitness & Aerobics
Center and several other firms. 

The state Department of Environmental Conservation will test between 10
and 20 properties on the opposite side of the Parkway, said Mary Jane
Peachey, regional scientist with the DEC. It is a secluded neighborhood
of tidy single-family homes shaded by old trees, tucked between the
Susquehanna River and an old rail bed that the town converted to a
pedestrian walkway. 

The news that pollution had reached the neighborhood shocked King Street
resident Becky Schramm. She and her husband, who both grew up in the
neighborhood, loved the area so much that they bought a home there 14
years ago to raise their two children, now ages 13 and 11. She had read
about vapor intrusion affecting properties in Endicott and Hillcrest,
but never imagined it would affect her home, which will soon be fitted
with a special underground ventilation system, paid for by the state
Superfund, to keep chemical gases from entering the basement. 

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.pressconnects.com/today/topstories/stories/to080205s182228.shtml



-- 


Lenny Siegel
Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org
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