[CPEO-MEF] Letter about South Weymouth

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Submitted by Dave Wilmot <DCatbird37@aol.com>

Congressman Delahunt,

              I am writing to you today to air important grievances I 
am finding with your representation to protect your constituents best 
interests, myself and my family included.

              As I'm sure you know, I am one of many people living in 
proximity to the former South Weymouth Naval Air Station who has been 
stricken with Multiple Sclerosis. I am one of the between 70 and 80 I 
know about. "Privacy Law" prohibits me from finding out anything that 
the State Department of Public Health has gathered over the past few 
years, with my help I may add.

              I know of few homes in my neighborhood untouched by 
cancers or chronic health conditions.

              Through multiple meetings at your office and years of 
impassioned email and letters, I have made sure to keep your staff 
(Corinne Young) and yourself, aware of my evolving Public Health 
concerns here. These concerns are shared by people all over the globe, 
who find themselves trying to raise their families and live their lives 
in proximity to industrial/military Superfund National Priority List 
Sites. The politics of the nation keep a shroud over most of this. It 
must be quite an effort and waste of funds.

              For years, your office has shown great interest in my 
concerns. Hardly ever a full day would pass without your office 
responding in some way to information I took the time to share with you. 
The information and concerns I took the time to share with you, I also 
attempted to convey to Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Kerry, the Navy, and the federal 
and state regulators involved in the BRAC/CERCLA cleanup of my longtime 
neighbor.

              Without demanding all responsible CERCLA cleanup measures 
to protect the Public Health, our government, and these all too itchy 
developers, are risking the lives of those of us that live here now, as 
well as the 3,000 new homeowners that will choose to live on the former 
base in the future.

              Allowing the start of what in large part is being 
concerted as a huge "village" residential development, before all 
responsible CERCLA-ordained environmental cleanup, is propagating what 
has started in Hanford, Washington and other contaminated military 
sites, as a continued governmental blind eye turned away from the 
environmental woes left for the Native American people, the urban and 
rural poor, and what here is the next tier of economically challenged 
bearers of increased chemical body burden, the lower income suburbanites 
labeled by this military BRAC cleanup process as deserving no more than 
government enforcement of  "urban cleanup levels." When I became a city 
dweller is unknown to me. Perhaps the Congressman could take the time 
away from quelling his recent bad press regarding missed votes to 
enlighten me?

              While a lifeless heavy-metal contaminated stream is 
allowed to continue flowing through our neighborhood, the position you 
have taken is to laud the excitement of the necessary "regional 
financial engine!!!" People in my neighborhood are excited by the new 
ambulance that is presented to us as mitigation by the developers for 
the increased pollution and clogged roadways this new "village" will 
saddle us with. Maybe the new ambulance will get us to South Shore 
Hospital quicker? Many, a voting majority of my neighbors were swayed to 
vote by the successful PR efforts funded by the developers. My neighbors 
are rightfully more involved in getting to their kids ball games and 
finding money for the mortgage for another month.

             I find the Congressman's silence in allowing this PR 
campaign to win the vote as a clear indication of what little my much 
stated health concerns means to "the big picture."

             The amount of disregard for adopting the "Precautionary 
Principle" our leaders show while chronic diseases escalates around me, 
astounds me.

              95% of my life is spent in a chair now. It gives me a lot 
of time to study the different aspects of my disease now.

              I find it interesting that the incidence of MS is 
exploding in this country...

              I find it interesting that many of the contaminants at 
high levels in the water, soil, and sediments at the base have been 
proven to cause cancer, birth defects, and chronic neurological problems 
like the disease I and my family, and so many of my neighbors struggle with.

              I had hoped you in particular, or someone of worldly 
significance, would find the time to grant me a response to the letter 
of concerns that I presented to Bryan Olson of the EPA at my home last 
Thursday, and later sent to you.

              I can not honestly affix blame to my own living next to 
this air station as direct cause of my affliction, as I'd mentioned many 
times before, I as a young man had worked in a Silver mine/Zinc Smelter 
in Idaho. That site is now the #1 National Priority List Superfund site 
in the country.

              I can honestly say this, the MDPH refusing to become 
involved with the EPA in drawing a complete picture of our 
neighborhood's health, via the "Basewide (and beyond) Watershed 
Assessment" now being planned by the EPA and Navy is a grave injustice 
and a blanket thrown atop the responsibility that our elected United 
States Congressman should hold as sound obligation.

              I can honestly say this, the Politics and Money Exchange 
that prohibits many Americans from our fair share of "Life, Liberty and 
the Pursuit of Happiness" is a moral crime, and I believe my elected 
Congressman has a duty to properly address the concerns of a constituent 
who is spending so much of his energy looking out for the welfare of all 
his constituents...

please think about that and respond will you?


sincerely,

David Wilmot
10 Arch St.
Abington, Ma. 02351


--
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
http://www.cpeo.org

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