[CPEO-MEF] No more mercury in New Haven

[CPEO Moderator <cpeo@cpeo.org>]

Indiana
Posted on Sun, May. 04, 2003
Enough, already
By Joe Beck
The Journal Gazette
No more mercury in New Haven


New Haven can't shake environmental controversies. Months after the city
settled its long struggle to make certain the Adams Center landfill
never reopens, the federal government has raised the possibility of
sending more than four additional tons of highly toxic mercury to the
military storage depot on Dawkins Road.

The anxiety stirred by the decision to include New Haven among a list of
potential storage sites for the military's surplus mercury is
understandable. Some forms of mercury can be extremely dangerous if they
are released into the environment.

Mercury has been stored safely at the Defense National Stockpile
Center's New Haven Depot for many decades, and the arrival of new
shipments is unlikely to significantly increase the risk to the
environment.

But mercury's track record in New Haven hasn't been enough to keep
residents from objecting, and they are right to do so. Many feel the
community has done more than its share of accepting environmental waste
from other places and fear that it will become known as a dumping
ground.

Hard feelings linger from the Adams Center landfill, and the city is in
the midst of fighting the establishment of a municipal waste transfer
station for garbage haulers, also on Dawkins Road, a mile or two west.

This article can be viewed at:
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/journalgazette/5784227.htm

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