Below is an interesting perspective on New York City's Superfund Alternative Plan for the Gowanus Canal by John Heltman, Associate Editor of Inside EPA's Superfund Report, an online news service of the publishers of Inside EPA.com. It is extremely enlightening and I hope you will take the time to read it.
I am reprinting it here on Pardon Me For Asking with their permission.
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5 comments:
Why should we give the city time? They should of done it years ago. Besides i thought they could do it "faster" than the EPA. According to Nydia Vasquez there is no money in WRDA. And contrary to the fear mongering put forth by anti-superfunders CleanGowanusNow! there IS money in the Superfund, Walter Mugdan said so at the last meeting. The EPA is ready to go. The City is not. Yet confuses us all with their "faster" mantra which they alternate with "what's the hurry".
Thanks for posting this Katia!
The City should throw in the towel now and go with EPA Superfund -work with them to do their part in remediating the canal. That's what the majority in the community have clearly, and in many and various ways, expressed. The developers on whose behalf the City is fighting EPA should seek other visions - because the behemoth visions they had for Gowanus were - and forever will be - environmentally inappropriate for this delicate location.
An interesting response on the SuperfundGowanus.org petition: My feeling is that I do not trust the city to properly align the interests of the people with that of its own to attract development in the area. I believe the powers that be will attract interested parties to invest in the cleanup by allowing them "certain" rights to build once the cleanup is completed. These rights to build will naturally be in the developer's best interest, not the community's with any resistance met with a deaf ear. There is entirely to much overbuilding in the Carrol Gardens community with respect to height and quality of life. I support the Superfund designation as a federal impartial party assigned specifically to the cleanup of a natural resource with no hidden agendas or obligations to the power brokers of New York City. Thank You.
The City has had plenty of time to clean the Gowanus and has done nothing. The EPA shouln't have allowed any comment period and should have just started the lawsuit / condemnation process in January! Mr. Mugdan said EPA has funds in place to start suing Gowanus businesses and owners and start cleaning the Canal! Why is this taking so long?
1:18 I'm so grateful for the EPA comment period because it has given the community the opportunity to witness and participate in the groundswell of support for Superfund, and also see that the City cannot come up with any viable alternate plan. In case you don't know what I am talking about, check out the responses on the EPA website, as well as on Superfundgowanus.org. Amazing how this is one time the people may actually prevail. Amazing, also, how developers' deep pockets and the City's massive powers did such an unimpressive job of trying to sway the public to support developers' agendas.
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