[CPEO-IRF] South Weymouth's (MA) Westgate Landfill

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Submitted by Dave Wilmot <dcatbird37@aol.com>


Hello.

   I don't really have any idea of whether anyone will actually read 
this effort or not as I have not heard from any of the addressees of my 
last posting to you, two weeks ago.

   I believe the questions I raised then were worthy of your attention, 
but I also know that my housebound existence might make me over anxious 
for responses, and my concerns are not always easy to address.

   Perhaps with the elections past us, I might look forward to some 
communication from the Congressman's office, or some interest from the 
locally elected or appointed, but I won't be holding my breath.

   Politics in place prohibit any true "Justice for All" from being 
more than a myth.

   The "Public Process" that exists here, has no use for my opinions, 
or the opinions of anyone engaged here outside the governing political web.

   Your combined silences would tell me that.

   Hopefully, you continue to speak with one another.

   Perhaps no one has any good answers to my stated questions/concerns?
   If this BRAC redevelopment process was a sound public process,I'd 
likely have fewer questions now, than I had eight years ago when I 
started my involvement.

   I don't. I have more and more questions, fueled by a quickly 
evolving Environmental Health industry and the fact that the great 
majority of my questions/concerns continue to go unanswered.

   Although Congressman Delahunt always returns a boilerplate "Thanks, 
I'll get back to you as soon as is humanly possible", concerns raised 
and questions posed years and years ago, remain unanswered.

    I probably am seen as harping on my firm belief, that leaving the 
West Gate Landfill on top of French's Stream is the wrong decision for a 
water-starved region.

    Globe would back me up.

    An article entitled "Access to clean water should be a basic human 
right", told of "water wars" in Africa, where 2 million children are 
dying each year for lack of potable water, and here at the site of the 
former South Weymouth Naval Air Station, former host communities are 
being told that their own water resources will be forever chemically 
corrupt, because our elected officials refuse to demand health 
protective cleanup/removal of military toxins.

     I don't believe high income towns better connected politically 
would need suffer the increased health burden that we are forced to sustain.

     Tuesday's paper also told of "Foreclosure filings surging in 
state(Massachusetts)", yet this worrisome trend  "has largely spared 
wealthy communities" and appears most often in working-class communities.

     Another article Tuesday reports that between 2002 and 2005 "Hunger 
has more than doubled in low-income areas (of Massachusetts)".

     Lower income communities are given less consideration for 
protection of Public Health than "Silk-stocking Towns".

     I don't for a second, believe people in Hingham or Duxbury would 
be subjected to these closure conditions that we are being forced into here.

     Whether by political connection, available funds or sheer number 
of lawyers, those communities would not sit still for this treatment. 
One way or the other they would be availed of the resources needed to 
protect the health of their families.

      The previously quoted African water article ends with calling for 
the United States to take part in leading a Global Action Plan for 
funding and protecting the "basic human right" of clean water for the 
affected largely poor African peoples.

      The author further states that the assistance should be looked at 
as an "investment with huge long-term returns in economic growth and 
basic quality of life. On practical as well as moral grounds."

      I applaud the humanitarianism of this proposed venture, and would 
surely applaud the same kind of forethought regarding "long-term 
practical and moral returns" right here downstream of the former South 
Weymouth Naval Air Station.

                                    sincerely, Dave Wilmot
--


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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