Re: Hunters Point "Rabble-Rousers"

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Your free subscription is supported by today's sponsor:
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Save up to 67% on Omaha Steaks + Get 6 FREE Burgers and a 
FREE Cutlery Set + Cutting Board!
http://click.topica.com/caacBBEaVxieSbnA7rua/OmahaSteaks
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Submitted by Saul Bloom <saulbloom@mindspring.com> of Arc Ecology:



As the Kerry for President campaign has learned to its dismay, if
someone makes a false allegation often and loudly enough, it has a
tendency to stick - particularly if one doesn't respond quickly.  As
such, and with due apologies to the readers of this listserve, Arc
Ecology would like to quickly present our perspective on comments
contained in a recently posted article regarding the Hunters Point
Shipyard.  

Two peoples can and often do look at the same issue differently.  Arc
Ecology's goal is to maximize cleanup, minimize institutional controls,
and make the former shipyard as safe a facility as possible from a
public health, environmental justice, and environmental quality
perspective.  For our part, Arc Ecology has chosen to engage directly
with the City, the Hunters Point Shipyard's master developer - Lennar,
and the Navy because we believe that is the surest way of attaining our
community and environmental constituency's goal of making those outcomes
a reality.  

Toward that end Arc's Executive Director authored the Proposition P
mentioned in the article. That proposition - approved by 87% of the
voters in San Francisco - set a community acceptance cleanup criteria
for the Shipyard that called for the most thorough remedial response
possible. Furthermore, Arc assisted in the drafting of the implementing
resolution for Prop P that established it as San Francisco's official
policy. With this principle firmly in place, Arc Ecology has been
working with the USEPA and California Department of Toxics Substances
Control to help frame their approaches to the will of the voters in San
Francisco.  

Having helped to establish a community acceptance standard for the
cleanup and transfer, we established an adhoc working group of
Agency/Community Based Organizations to address the issue of PCBs in the
sediments of two inlets of the San Francisco Bay that surround the
Shipyard.  We also chaired a City Agency/ Community focus group that
helped the Mayor's office negotiate its property transfer agreement with
the Navy, which provides a substantial degree of environmental and
public health protection.

We have convened a technical team to evaluate the practicality of
removing the Shipyard's largest landfill and are managing a project that
will be designing a public park to hopefully be built on what will
become the remediated site of the former landfill.  Our project partners
include such notable environmental organizations as the Audubon Society,
the Clean Water Fund, and Literacy for Environmental Justice, as well as
academic institutions like the University of San Francisco and San Jose
State University.  Furthermore when the Navy released volume 2 of its
Historical Radiological Assessment for the Hunters Point Shipyard
earlier this year, we hired an outside technical expert - Radioactive
Waste Management Associates - to evaluate the radiological issues.   We
could go on, but we hope you get the picture.

Arc Ecology has a long been an effective advocate for protecting the
environment and public health, particularly at Hunters Point.  Some may
consider the above a sign that we have gone soft, but then again there
were some folks who thought Ronald Reagan was soft on Communism. 

-- 


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

Your free subscription is supported by today's sponsor:
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Save on inkjet and toner, and get free shipping on orders over $50.
http://click.topica.com/caacBByaVxieSbnA7ruf/Inksoutlet
-------------------------------------------------------------------

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CPEO: A DECADE OF SUCCESS.  Your generous support will ensure that our 
important work on military and environmental issues will continue.  
Please consider one of our donation options.  Thank you.
http://www.groundspring.org/donate/index.cfm?ID=2086-0|721-0