Politics & Government

Schumer Demands Toxic Plume Clean-Up

Senator writes to Navy and regulators calling for plan by next week.

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-NY, is calling for quicker action by the Navy and environmental agencies on cleaning up toxic groundwater from the former Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve site in Bethpage.

Schumer wrote a letter to the agencies asking them to be more aggressive in treating the toxic plume and to release a plan on the cleanup to be released before March 31.

"Rather than post-contamination well-head treatment, which is costly and allows pollution to spread, I urge that the Navy be required to agree to a comprehensive clean-up and monitoring plan similar to that proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency," Schumer wrote in the letter, which was addressed to the heads of the Navy, EPA, and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

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The contaminated groundwater, orginated at the Bethpage site, which was used by the Navy and the Grumman Corporation for research and manufacturing. The toxic water has been drifting towards south shore water supplies.

Area water districts are concerned that their water supplies could be affected within four years. 

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Massapequa Water District Commissioner Thomas Hand also urged action, saying the agencies, "have all had at least 25 years to mitigate this site."

"To date they have failed to do so and in fact the responsible parties have pointed fingers at each other," Hand said.

Schumer is calling for the state DEC to release the newest remediation plan, which he said was delayed by Hurricane Sandy. He also asked that the DEC establish a timeline that requires milestones be met by certain dates.

He also called on the Navy to follow a recent EPA proposal calling for two or more additional remediation recovery wells and full delineation consisting of two dozen monitoring wells along the western portion of the plume and moving the wells on the east-side to the south.

The Senator was critical of the Navy's current policy of well-head monitoring which he says calls for the building of pollution treatment systems once contamination has been discovered.

"The policy of wellhead treatment is inefficient and costly and allows carcinogens to contaminate vulnerable and precious underground drinking water supplies," he wrote in the letter "To better preserve public health it is far preferable to require the Navy to follow a more vigorous remediation plan."

Scumer concluded by saying, "The bottom line is that more needs to be done to protect both Nassau’s precious drinking water and Nassau’s ratepayers."

"I concur with the EPA analysis that the Navy be required to follow a more comprehensive plan to remediate contaminated soil as well as to construct an enhanced program of monitoring stations."

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