Deep in the Heart of Toxins
L A Wood, East Bay Express, December 6, 1996

In Potter Wickware's story 'My Wife Smells Something: West Oakland's Toxics Scare' (Cityside, November 29), the toxics are not all that stink. How could anyone be surprised at the events surrounding this community crisis!

Certainly not the EPA and the other state regulatory agencies who over the last fifteen years have promoted lower standards for the cleanup of contaminated properties and who are now allowing wholesale "capping-over" of these sites.

The cries of the West Oakland residents living near this highly toxic plume are being echoed by many inner-city communities across the country. These communities, most often poor, minority ones, are paying for our failure to comprehensively clean up these poisonous brownfields. The health risks associated with such sites is both a cause for alarm and a clear case of environmental racism.

This national dilemma can also be seen next door in the city of Emeryville. They claim that 55 percent of the city is known to be toxic. However, its redevelopment agency is currently proposing capping over the entire city and just leaving the toxics in place. It should come as no surprise that the cries of its citizens will not be heard either. Like in Oakland, their voices are now being drowned out by the construction din of redevelopment. Perhaps the EXPRESS can do a story on them in a few years, if indeed, they are still around.