Toxins Found at Skate Park
Bonnie Chance, Daily Californian, November 28, 2000

Toxins Found at Skate Park: City Halts Construction, Says There Is No Public Health Threat

Construction of a West Berkeley skate park is delayed due to the discovery of toxic chemicals in groundwater beneath the site -- something environmentalists have been warning about since the project's inception.

The presence of the carcinogenic hexavalent chromium on the site became known to the city on Nov. 17, upon which immediate action was taken to divert the water from the storm drain to temporary containers, said Nabil Al-Hadithy, the city's hazardous materials supervisor.

The chemical deposits were found in the dirt basins of the planned skateboard park on Fifth and Harrison streets, more than nine-feet deep. Hexavalent chrome, also known as chromium 6, is toxic and largely used for plating, Al-Hadithy said.

While the City Council originally authorized at its meeting last Tuesday $100,000 to pump the contaminated water out of the site and to install a filter system, city officials decided last week to stop pumping out the water, since continuously filling and emptying the tanks was not the most economical, nor practical, solution, project officials said.

City officials said the chromium 6 is not an immediate threat to public health, making reference to the infamous 1996 Erin Brockovich case which was recently made into movie starring Julia Roberts. In that case, residents of the small town Hinkley, Calif. won a $333 million settlement from Pacific Gas and Electric because their tanks leaked chromium-6 into water supplies.

"Erin Brockovich" showed a lot of suffering because people were drinking that water," Al-Hadithy said. "(But) there is no drinking of water in Berkeley's plume (of chromium)."

Site of the skateboard park

While the city conducted a $25,000 study of the soil and groundwater of the 6.4 acres in 1997, it was determined to be a safe area that posed no significant health risks. Partially as a result of these studies, the city decided to purchase the property from UC Berkeley, which owned it since the 1950s.

The university used the area primarily for storage and did not know of any chromium 6 on the site when the property was sold, although a site assessment in the early 1980s revealed soil contamination by lead, most likely from previous industrial users, said UC Berkeley spokesperson Marie Felde.

"The university had no idea that there was any chromium at the site," she said. "Everything that we knew about we submitted to the city."

The responsible party that will cover the costly repair ventures is yet to be determined. The city has alleged, however, that the source of the chemical is a neighboring chrome plating facility, Western Roto Engravers/Color Tech.

"The city has made a mistake and I am hoping they are not going to blame others for it," said Bill MacKay, vice president of the company. He added that the company has worked with the city for the past nine years.

L A Wood, a Berkeley environmental activist who has voiced his disapproval of the project since the start, warned that there would be environmental hazards. He said the recent discovery of chromium 6 is a "major failure" for the city. "(The city) didn't do a normal evaluation (of the site)," he said. "They should have flagged off the site as a problem, but instead the council allowed the environmental commission to spend (only) 25K on answering whether children would be safe." Wood warned that the chromium is now headed toward the nearby bay.

No skateboarders were in sight on Fifth and Harrison streets yesterday, although several construction workers and bulldozers were preparing the bordering grounds for sidewalks. Work stopped in the actual park as soon as the construction team was notified about the chromium, said Jim Segler, superintendent of the park project. Site clearing began last April, and since then they have worked in different phases of construction.

"We've been told we're okay and that there is no health threat to our workers or the neighbors," he said. "As long as we are not diving and bathing in the water, we re okay."

The city hired an independent toxicologist to study the area and report back on his findings within a week.