Re: [CPEO-MEF] PFAS: Senators ask Defense Department for better community engagement

[Lenny Siegel <LSiegel@cpeo.org>]

There is precedent for this. Beginning with what became the Federal Facilities Environmental Restoration Dialogue Committee in 1990, the Defense Department (DOD) locally and nationally engaged people from communities impacted by military contamination in forums and trainings. The Department actually paid for activist travel. I spoke at a number of DOD internal trainings.

By the time PFAS appeared on the figurative radar screen, few in the Defense Department remembered these efforts. Around 2015, I met with a top DOD environmental official, warning of the growing concern about PFAS exposure, and I suggested a national multi-stakeholder forum or dialogue. To this day, there has been no such interchange, but the National Academies Committee on Guidance on PFAS Testing and Health Outcomes has done an excellent job of involving representatives of impacted communities in its PFAS study.

Lenny

> On Jan 24, 2022, at 11:29 AM, Lenny Siegel <LSiegel@cpeo.org> wrote:
> 
> HASSAN ASKS DEFENSE DEPARTMENT FOR BETTER PFAS COMMUNICATION
> 
> 
> By Dan Alexander
> Seacoast Current (NH)
> January 21, 2022
> 
> A Portsmouth mother's persistence paid off, as her testimony before a Senate hearing about Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) contamination at military installation led to a push from Sen. Maggie Hassan for better communication.
> 
> …
> 
> “We urge you to solicit and incorporate input from community leaders and organizations as the Department improves [restoration advisory boards] and [restoration advisory committees], and to listen to the priorities of those impacted as the Department carries out its statutorily-mandated efforts to keep communities across our nation safe from PFAS,” the senators wrote in their letter.
> 
> During the hearing, Amico said the Department of Defense needs to host routine listening sessions with local communities, improve transparency by allowing more access to exposure data, and improve relations with local Restoration Advisory Boards and Restoration Advisory Committees.
> 
> …
> 
> For the entire article, see
> https://seacoastcurrent.com/hassan-asks-defense-department-for-better-pfas-communication/
> 
> —
> 
> Lenny Siegel
> Executive Director
> Center for Public Environmental Oversight
> A project of the Pacific Studies Center
> LSiegel@cpeo.org
> P.O. Box 998, Mountain View, CA 94042
> Voice/Fax: 650-961-8918
> http://www.cpeo.org
> Author: DISTURBING THE WAR: The Inside Story of the Movement to Get Stanford University out of Southeast Asia - 1965–1975 (See http://a3mreunion.org)
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Military mailing list
> Military@lists.cpeo.org
> http://lists.cpeo.org/listinfo.cgi/military-cpeo.org

—

Lenny Siegel
Executive Director
Center for Public Environmental Oversight
A project of the Pacific Studies Center
LSiegel@cpeo.org
P.O. Box 998, Mountain View, CA 94042
Voice/Fax: 650-961-8918
http://www.cpeo.org
Author: DISTURBING THE WAR: The Inside Story of the Movement to Get Stanford University out of Southeast Asia - 1965–1975 (See http://a3mreunion.org)

_______________________________________________
Military mailing list
Military@lists.cpeo.org
http://lists.cpeo.org/listinfo.cgi/military-cpeo.org