EPA Finalizes Agreement with New York City on Combined Sewer Overflow Tank Design

The US Environmental Protection Agency just today issued a press release announcing that the Federal Agency has finalized its agreement with the City of New York regarding the location of one of two Combined Sewer Overflow tanks, which are part of the remedy for the Gowanus Canal clean-up.

This is disappointing but not unexpected news since it seemed clear from the beginning that Regional Administrator Judith Enck was willing to make concessions to the City in regards to the siting of the tank that will:

- include the taking of land by eminent domain
-prolong the timeline of the environmental clean-up 

-allow the City to re-contaminate for a period after the canal has been dredged and capped since the tank may not be completed before then.

-and will cost local residents more money in taxes and water rates.

When the proposed agreement was first outlined for the community this spring, the Gowanus Canal Community Advisory Group asked the EPA to please give local residents and organizations time to comment.  EPA's response to the public's comments can be found here.
The comments may not have made a difference in Enck's mind ultimately, but it was still important to capture them for the record.

What is your reaction to this announcement?

(New York, N.Y. – June 9, 2016) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today finalized an agreement with the City of New York that secures the design of the larger of two combined sewage and storm water overflow (CSO) retention tanks, which are key components of the Gowanus Canal cleanup, including both the tank’s size and location. It also requires New York City to undertake activities to prepare that location for the tank installation and to pay EPA’s oversight costs. Prior to finalizing the agreement with New York City, the EPA accepted comments from the public for 45 days and attended two Brooklyn community meetings to explain the proposal. A response to the public comments has been issued with the final order.

The final administrative agreement and order released today allows New York City to locate an eight million gallon retention tank in New York City’s preferred location, known as the “Head-of-Canal” location, but it also holds the city to a strict schedule with monetary penalties imposed if violations of the schedule occur. Also, the EPA can require New York City to place the tank in the Thomas Greene Park location instead if certain activities do not occur on schedule, including if New York City is not able to acquire the land at the Head-of-Canal location within approximately four years. Locations for staging and other work related to the construction of the 8 million gallon retention tank will be acquired by New York City as part of the ongoing design phase of the project.

“The New York City Parks Department prefers not to have a large sewage retention tank
permanently located in a city park,” said Judith A. Enck, EPA Regional Administrator. “The EPA is committed to preserving urban parkland and worked with the City of New York on this alternate location. This alternate location meets the dual goals of cleaning up the canal while also protecting urban parkland.”

More than a dozen contaminants, including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and heavy metals such as mercury, lead and copper, were found at high levels in the sediment in the Gowanus Canal. PAHs and heavy metals were also found in the canal water. PAHs are a group of chemicals that are formed during the incomplete burning of coal, oil, gas, wood, garbage or other organic substances. PCBs were used as coolants and lubricants in transformers, capacitors and other electrical equipment, and their manufacture was banned in 1979. PCBs and PAHs are suspected of being cancer-causing and PCBs can have neurological effects as well. To this day, people can still be found fishing in the Gowanus, despite advisories about not eating fish from the canal. In 2010, the Gowanus Canal was added to EPA’s Superfund list of the nation’s most contaminated hazardous substance sites.

The EPA issued its final cleanup plan for the Gowanus Canal Superfund site on September 27, 2013. The cleanup includes dredging contaminated sediment that has accumulated on the bottom of the canal as a result of industrial and sewer discharges. The dredged areas will be capped. The EPA’s cleanup plan also calls for the construction of two sewage and storm water retention tanks to significantly reduce CSO discharges from two key locations in the upper portion of the canal. These discharges are not being addressed by current New York City upgrades to the sewer system. Without these controls, CSO discharges would re-contaminate the canal after its cleanup. The plan also includes controls to prevent other land-based sources of contamination from compromising the cleanup. The canal design work is expected to continue for another two years, including a dredging and capping pilot which the EPA expects will be initiated at the 4th Street basin in 2017, followed by the start of full-scale cleanup construction at the top of the canal in 2018.

The EPA’s cleanup plan assumed possible locations for the two tanks, both owned by New York City -- the Thomas Greene Park location for the larger tank at the top of the canal and the Department of Sanitation salt storage lot located at 2nd Avenue and 5th Street for the smaller tank in the middle of the canal. The cleanup plan specified that the final locations would be determined during the design phase of the project. The EPA and New York City have already agreed that one tank, with a capacity of four million gallons, will be located at the Department of Sanitation salt storage lot.

For the larger eight million gallon tank at the top of the canal, New York City proposed as its preferred location two adjacent properties on Nevins Street between Butler and DeGraw Streets. Under the agreement, the larger tank will be located at the Head-of-Canal location. The agreement also requires the City to carry out actions to prepare that site for installation of the tank, including removal of contaminated soil. As a contingency, the agreement also requires New York City to work concurrently on a tank design for the Thomas Greene Park location. If the agreement conditions are not met within timeframes specified in the agreement, the EPA can require New York City to construct the tank at the Thomas Greene Park location.

The final administrative agreement and order will be posted by close of business today at this link:https://semspub.epa.gov/src/collection/02/SC34404

EPA’s responsiveness to comments will be posted today at: https://semspub.epa.gov/src/document/02/395898

To learn more about the Gowanus Canal Superfund site, visit: https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursites/csitinfo.cfm?id=0206222

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Dear EPA Region 2 Administrator Enck: Public Comments Regarding Settlement Agreement Between EPA And The City On Siting Of CSO Tank In Gowanus

As mentioned in previous PMFA posts, the Environmental Protection Agency is currently accepting comments from the public in regards to a proposed Gowanus Canal Administrative Settlement Agreement with New York City. The agreement would allow the City to site one of the two retention tanks mandated in the Record of Decision at the head of the Canal rather than at the EPA suggested site which is under the pool in Thomas Greene Park.

The City's plan relies on the taking of two privately owned sites, 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street, by eminent domain. A third site, 270 Nevins Street will most likely also be seized by the City, which plans to use it for staging purposes during the construction project.

This would displace several businesses, including Eastern Effects, a successful film and television studio, where many commercials, movies and television shows like FX's "The Americans" are filmed.

The public comment period will end on May 31. 

I send my own comment to EPA this past Tuesday and thought I would post it here, together with the statement of Carroll Gardens Coalition for Respectful Development  and of reader Becky, who was kind enough to sent hers to us.

Read on.

Gowanus Canal Administrative Settlement Agreement And Order For Remedial Design, Removal Action and Cost Recovery

Dear Administrator Enck,

I would like to express my absolute dismay over the proposed agreement between the Environmental Protection Agency and the City of New York to situate one of the two retention tanks mandated in the Record of Decision at the head of the Canal rather than at the EPA suggested site which is under the pool in the Thomas Greene Park.

As a member of the Carroll Gardens/ Gowanus Community and a founding member of the Gowanus Canal Superfund Community Advisory Group, I am at a loss to explain why you and your Agency would enter into an agreement with the City, a Potentially Responsible Party, that:

- will cost tax and rate payers hundreds of millions of dollars more than if the tank were to be placed under Thomas Greene Park. (In her 2016-2019 budget, NYC DEP Commissioner Lloyd set aside $510 million to cover "the cost to secure land, design two CSO tanks and construct ONE of the two planned CSO tanks adjacent to the Gowanus Canal". EPA estimated the entire clean-up of the Gowanus Superfund Site at $500 million.)

- relies on the taking of two privately owned sites, 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street, by eminent domain. A third site, 270 Nevins Street, may also be seized by the City. This would displace Eastern Effects, a successful film and television studio, which employs anywhere from 350 to 450 employees, and contributes, by their estimate, approximately, four million dollars ($4,000,000) per year to the local economy.
Somehow, one cannot shake the suspicion that this is all a huge land grab by the city and more tied to the imminent rezoning of the Gowanus corridor than to an honest willingness to assume responsibility for polluting the canal.

- would grant the City more than four years to negotiate the unnecessary legal wrangling associated with condemnation and ULURP certification.

- would allow the City to re-contaminate the canal with CSO after it has been dredged and capped. (Walter Mugdan, at a public meeting, mentioned that 2-8 years could pass between dredging and the completion of the tank.)

I fail to see any benefits for the community in this agreement. I do not believe, as EPA implies, that a 'covenant not to sue' by the City is worth paying twice as much for the remedy, years of additional CSO contamination, and additional cleaning AFTER remediation.
Surely, the threat of a law suit by a PRP is business as usual for the EPA. One would expect nothing less from a polluter. Why then, in this case, does it seem as if the Federal Government is bending backwards to placate the City, which has done precious little to address its environmental responsibility in Gowanus.

It would also appear that the EPA administration was blinded by the City's assertion that using Douglass Greene Park for the siting of the retention tank constituted 'park alienation'. I believe that the City used the shortage of green space and the temporary loss of an amenity like the Double D Pool as a diversion. The real environmental justice issue has always been the fact that the City chose to build a park and pool on a heavily polluted former MGP site, thereby exposing generations of children to possible harm.
It seems ironic that the City continues to use our 1.8 mile long canal as an open sewer, thereby preventing the community from enjoying the roughly 12 acres of recreational public space the Gowanus could provide if cleaned.

I strongly believe that the EPA should NOT sign the agreement and not allow a PRP to renegotiate the timeline set forth in the Record of Decision. The EPA should compel the City to work with National Grid to site the tank under the Double D pool in Thomas Greene Park. If the DEP insists on building a head house and wants to increase park land, it should purchase either 233-239 Nevins Street or 537 Sackett Street, both currently for sale and located directly adjacent to the lots the City plans on seizing.
This would be a win-win-win situation for the community, the DEP and the EPA since it would address all concerns and needs at once.

The residents living near the Gowanus Canal put their trust in EPA when they overwhelmingy supported the listing of their polluted waterway as a Superfund site. Please don't forsake the interests of the community to accommodate a PRP.

Respectfully,
Katia Kelly


Here is Carroll Gardens Coalition for Respectful Development's comment to EPA

Dear Administrator Enck and Director Mugdan,

It is with deeply conflicting emotions and heavy hearts that we write to you regarding the pending agreement between the EPA and the City of New York.

Our organization, CORD, is a completely volunteer group. We are local residents,home owners, business owners, parents, children and grandparents. We do not have nor have we ever sought not for profit status. We receive funds from no one and we do not seek or accept donations. We devote our time to our community simply because we care.

Once the Gowanus Canal was nominated to the NPL, we spent a great deal of time advocating for it. We celebrated its listing. We championed your presence in our neighborhood and we listened very carefully to you.

We immediately applied for and became members of the Community Advisory Group and carried back all of the information we received there to our members.

We established a relationship with our EPA "team". We rejoiced in the accessibility and transparency they provided. We grew fond of them and still believe that they represent the finest example of how any government agency and its employees should conduct themselves.

When the ROD was issued, because we were listening carefully, we understood that the only "negotiable" part of the ROD was the inclusion of a containment facility in Red Hook. The Red Hook community said 'NO' and it was dropped.

But, in spite of the fact that EPA often spoke of how they do not get involved in land use--and that only the containment facility was negotiable, the retention tank sitings were suddenly up in the air.

We were certain that common sense, a sense of purpose and fiscal responsibility would prevail, but unfortunately, a grandiose Gowanus land use plan somewhat disguised as a crusade to save a swimming pool situated beneath contaminated earth, is going to delay the cleanup by a number of years, cost private property owners their land, businesses their livelihood, many employees their jobs and taxpayers a big hit to their pockets.

Add to the above the most painful cost of all--a recontamination of the expensive Canal cleanup before anyone gets to enjoy the fully realized benefits of this costly and complicated remediation.

We understand that EPA gets an assurance that NYC will not pursue litigation regarding the necessity of the retention tanks. Ok. That is a good thing, we suppose, but it comes at an extremely high price to the community and seems pitifully inequitable.

So, although we understand that the EPA has tried to make a deal with NYC that appeases some, eliminates the possibility of (even more) lengthy litigation, and eventually gets the job, "sort of" done, we so hoped and believed that "sort of" would never be good enough for our heroes at the EPA.

Finally, we cannot help but wonder what kind of precedent this will set with the other major PRP, National Grid as well as for other future Superfund sites.

We were the first ever Superfund site in NYC.

The plan and subsequent ROD was as big, bold, encompassing and complicated as the Gowanus is contaminated.

The cost analysis was calculated, thoughtful and responsible.

The rewards were to be enormous- a healthier environment, an urban waterway with drastically reduced toxins AND pathogens surrounded by many acres of open green space along its banks.

We loved it. We believed in it. We counted on it.

How tragic that this historic project will not be remembered in this way. Instead, it's legacy will be the Superfund site where the EPA did, indeed, get involved in land use.

It will be the site where a great deal of taxpayers' monies were spent on a job that was only "sort of" successful.

It's quasi clean condition necessitating further remediation post cleaning and capping will certainly appear wasteful--a black eye to the Superfund program since after all, you were supposed to be the final word.

And worst of all, the Superfund site where the Record of Decision became the Record of Indecision and Genuflection to Political Pressure brought to us by the Grand Puppeteers--the Development Gods of NYC.

It is all so terribly disheartening and sad.

Sincerely,

Lucy DeCarlo, Rita Miller, Triada Samaras
Co-Founders, CG CORD/Carroll Gardens-Gowanus Coalition for Respectful Development

And here is the statement by Becky X.

Gowanus Canal: Comment on on Proposed Settlement Agreement for Siting, Design and Site Prep for RH-034 CSO Retention Tank
Dear Mr. Mugdan,

Something stinks in Gowanus – and I'm not talking about the canal.

The proposed use of eminent domain for the siting of the necessary retention tanks could not possibly be a worse decision, designed to set up the project for complete failure.

Why, when there are multiple other viable options, all less expensive and more time-efficient than the eminent domain "solution," has this agreement been allowed to go forward? Is this a deliberate sabotage? Does someone have photographs of EPA Regional Administrator Judith A. Enck with a goat? I begin to think so.

I have lived in the area for over 14 years, supported the Superfund designation and have been following the proceedings closely, looking forward to a day when we can safely enjoy the clean canal waterway the neighborhood deserves, and has worked so hard to attain.

When the Superfund designation finally went through, over the strenuous objections and all the dirty tricks NYC could throw at the process in an effort to weasel out of any responsibility, we were so relieved. We were prepared to live through the inconvenience of the cleanup work that we knew would need to be done, and realistically would take years to complete. The result would be worth it.

But before we've even started, the process has left the community stripped of agency and trust. We feel angered and betrayed as the people and government agents supposed to be advocating for us, have caved to pressure and given us this completely unworkable plan.

The obvious site for the retention tanks is the Thomas Greene Park. The "Save the Park" petition going around has thrown up a smokescreen around the real issues of this space.

The Park sits on polluted soil and requires remediation in order to be safe – a project which could be folded into the Superfund cleanup, saving time and money. The NYC Parks Department has called the Park "underutilized" as it is, and at present the pool is only open two months out of the year. Impact on the community would therefore be minimized. I believe this option WOULD in fact be saving the Park. It's currently oozing liquid coal tar, for goodness sake! We should be jumping at this opportunity to get it remediated and clean for public use!

This win-win scenario has been rejected.

As an alternative, local developer Alloy has taken the unprecedented step of offering to donate a nearby parcel to City expressly for siting of the retention tanks, in return for certain considerations given to their proposed new office building project in the area.
I understand this solution would also result in additional parkland at the end of the project.

This, too, has been rejected with no explanation.

Eastern Effects at 242 Nevins Street, one of the properties under eminent domain threat by the City, has just put out a very moving letter outlining the devastation this thuggish move would have on their thriving local business and their investment in the area, impacting the local economy significantly. This is a thriving local business that our elected officials are supposed to be trying to protect!

As a well-known and successful film/TV production company, ejecting Easter Effects would be mud in the City's eye and terrible PR if nothing else. NYC likes to describe itself as supportive to the film and TV industry; hard to believe at this point.

Eastern Effects included an overhead diagram showing three alternate sites nearby that would be better choices for the siting of the retention tanks. I have yet to hear any reasoning for why these sites have not been considered viable options.

Please, do not bow to the crooked demands of one of the main responsible parties for the polluted state of the canal in the first place, to the great detriment of the community you are supposedly trying to improve. Don't waste our time, our money, and our goodwill on a process that purports to be transparent, yet so blatantly rejects community input for obvious selfish gain. Be the force for good that we believed you to be, the reason why we expended so much energy and overcame so many seemingly impossible obstacles to bring our polluted canal to national attention.

Do the right thing and reject this agreement.

Thank you,

Becky X

I hope that others will be inspired to write to EPA as well. As I mentioned, the comment period ends on May 31st, so time is of the essence.

Please address your comments to:
Walter Mugdan, U.S. EPA Superfund Director
290 Broadway, 19th Flr.,
New York, NY 10007
email: mugdan.walter@epa.gov

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This Coming Monday, EPA To Hold Community Meeting To Explain Proposed Agreement With New York City On Siting Of CSO Tanks That Are Part Of Superfund Clean-Up

Looking towards the top of the Gowanus Canal.

Double D Pool At Thomas Greene Park, EPA's preferred site for CSO retention tank

234 Butler Street: New York City's preferred site for the 8-million gallon CSO retention tank

242 Nevins Street, second privately owned site eyed by the City

On April 14th, the Environmental Protection Agency Region 2 released a statement regarding a proposed agreement the Agency has reached with New York City on the location of two sewage and storm water retention tanks that are an important part of the Superfund clean-up of the Gowanus Canal.
The tanks are combined sewer overflow (CSO) control measures meant to significantly reduce overall contaminated solid discharges to the Canal.

The proposed administrative settlement agreement and order allows New York City to locate the larger of the two tanks on New York City’s preferred location on privately-owned land at the head of the canal that the City needs to first take by eminent domain, which will add cost and time to the overall clean-up of the Gowanus Canal.
EPA will hold a public meeting to explain the proposed agreement on Monday, April 25, 2016, 6:30PM at P.S. 32 located at 317 Hoyt St., Brooklyn, NY

Before finalizing the agreement with New York City, EPA has granted the community a 30 day public comment period.  I do hope that everyone will take the time to attend and to send a comment prior to the EPA finalizing the agreement.

Why is this meeting so important?
For months now, the EPA and the City have been negotiating the siting of the larger of the two tanks.
EPA Region 2 suggested placing the 8-million gallon tank underneath the Double D pool at Thomas Greene Park near Nevins Street. The Agency reasoned that the pool needs to be removed anyway because it sits on the former Brooklyn Union Gas Fulton Municipal Manufactured Gas Plant which needs to be remediated. Also, the parkland is already owned by the City, which would save the acquisition cost.

The NYC DEP, on the other hand, preferred to site the 8-million gallon tank on privately-owned land along the canal, adjacent to the park. The sites in question are 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street.
The City reasons that it wants the tanks in closer proximity to the rest of its Gowanus infrastructure at the head of the canal. It also wants to build a head-house for the mechanical elements related to the tank. The above ground head house envisioned by the City would take up 1/4 of Thomas Greene Park if built there, DEP argues. The neighborhood is already underserved as far as green spaces is concerned according to the City. Using the privately owned parcels would allow them to maintain the park as is and add additional parkland on those purchased parcels.

Building the tank on private land is going to cost the City upward of $125 million for land acquisition alone according to its own estimate. It will also delay the entire Superfund clean-up by a minimum of four and a half years, time the City estimates it needs to go through condemnation proceedings.
At a community meeting in January, Region 2 Superfund Director Walter Mugdan admitted that, "the chunk of time [because of these legal proceedings] would be longer in almost all certainty than if the tank went to the park location."
It remains clear that EPA still sees the Park as the best location for the tank because it will save time and money.
"I still believe that is pretty accurate," Mugdan told the community in January. "Since the pool needs to be dismantled anyhow, it seems like a pretty logical location to put the CS0 tank."
Further, the EPA team responsible for the environmental remediation design for the Gowanus Canal Superfund has been clear that building the tanks on the City's preferred site immediately adjacent to the waterway creates some very difficult engineering challenges.

Why Would EPA Cave To The City, One Of The Parties Responsible For Polluting the Canal?

EPA Region 2 Administrator Judith Enck

When it comes down to it, it appears that the City was being able to turn the potential loss of one portion of Thomas Greene Park into an environmental justice issue that swayed EPA Region 2 Administrator Judith Enck into giving in despite the advice of her own team.

Perhaps, Administrator Enck should have been informed that the NYC Parks Department has described Thomas Greene Park as 'underutilized', that the City wanted to close the DD pool five years ago because of lack of funds, that the pool is only open two months out of the year and that NYC was very much aware of the fact that there was liquid coal tar oozing under parts of the park and that it would, at one point, need the site would need to be remediated.

It would certainly behoove the Gowanus community to remind Administrator Enck that parkland preservation is NOT an EPA issue, but exposure to environmental contamination is.

The longer the Gowanus Superfund clean-up takes, the longer the community is exposed to it. THAT should be Administrator Enck's priority.

What's in it for the City?

NYC Department Of Environmental Protection Commissioner Emily Lloyd

The City has used the Gowanus Canal as an open sewer for well over 150 years. One administration after another has done the very least it could to find a  real solution to bring relief to the Gowanus Community.  Simply put, New York City has shirked its responsibility for decades by kicking the can down the road.  Not only did the City oppose the nomination of the Gowanus Canal as a Superfund, it  is now using the siting of the tanks to delay even further.

This delay tactic will cost the City dearly. As mentioned before, acquisition costs for the land is estimated at $125 million. That may not even include legal costs for condemnation proceedings. 

On March 11, 2016, NYC DEP Commissioner Emily Lloyd presented DEP's Preliminary Four-Year Capital Plan in front of New York City Council Committee on Environmental Protection.

Commissioner Lloyd's DEP budget for 2016-2019 reads:
"Gowanus Combined Sewer Overflow Retention Tanks: To significantly reduce the combined sewer overflow discharges into Gowanus Canal, $510 million was added in the Plan to secure land, design two CSO tanks and construct one of the two planned CSO tanks adjacent to the Gowanus Canal."

Yes, that really reads $510 million dollars. And yes, if you read very carefully, that amount of money only covers the construction of "one of the two" CSO tanks.

(Notice that no money seems to have been set aside for the second tank in this four year budget.)

Considering that the EPA has estimated the entire cost of the Gowanus Canal Superfund clean-up to cost $500 million, why would it cost the City $510 million to construct just one of two CSO tanks?

Councilman Brad Lander, whose district includes most of the Gowanus Canal, does not seem to have a problem with this large sum of money.  He seemed happy about it when he tweeted about it on his Twitter feed during the budget meeting on March 11.

So, there you have it.  The agreement between the City and EPA on the siting of the tanks allows DEP to inflate the cost, will mean the taking of private land in Gowanus, and most importantly, will expose the community to contaminants longer than absolutely necessary.

Yes, we may get some extra parkland out of the deal, but that would be the priciest parkland ever constructed in New York City's history. 

So please, make every effort to attend the meeting to express your opinion.

To read the agreement between the EPA and New York City, please visit:
https://www3.epa.gov/region02/superfund/npl/gowanus/

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EPA Region 2 Administrator Enck Just Blinked And May Now Have Allowed New York City To Delay The Gowanus Canal Superfund Clean-Up

Looking at the head of the Gowanus Canal.

Thomas Greene Park in Gowanus

Mostly desolate Thomas Greene Park on a beautiful spring day this March

Double D Pool At Thomas Greene Park, EPA's preferred site for CSO retention tank

234 Butler Street: New York City's preferred site for the 8-million gallon CSO retention tank

242 Nevins Street, second privately owned site eyed by the City

EPA Proposes Locations for Two Sewage Retention Tanks as Part of Gowanus Canal Cleanup
Public Encouraged to Provide Comments
Contact: Elias Rodriguez, (212) 637-3664, rodriguez.elias@epa.gov
(New York, N.Y. – April 14, 2016) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced a proposed agreement with the City of New York that establishes the location for two sewage and storm water retention tanks, included as part of the cleanup for the Gowanus Canal Superfund Site. The agreement sets out a schedule for the design of the larger of the two tanks. It also requires New York City to undertake activities to prepare that location for the tank installation, and to pay EPA oversight costs. Prior to finalizing the agreement with New York City, the EPA is accepting public comments. The proposed administrative settlement agreement and order released today allows New York City to locate an eight million gallon retention tank in New York City’s preferred location, known as the “Head- of-Canal” location, but it also holds the city to a strict schedule. The EPA can require New York City to place the tank in the Thomas Greene Park location instead, if certain activities do not occur on schedule, including if New York City is not able to acquire the land at the Head-of-Canal location within approximately four years. The EPA is accepting public input on the work contained in the proposed agreement for the next 30 days and will have a public meeting on April 25 to discuss the work being secured under the agreement.
“Cleaning up the Gowanus Canal is a daunting task which not only involves dredging toxic sediment, but also building huge retention tanks to reduce the amount of raw sewage that flows into the canal,” said Judith A. Enck, EPA Regional Administrator. “Getting these tanks installed is a key component of the cleanup. The New York City Parks Department prefers not to have a large sewage retention tank permanently located in a city park. The EPA is also committed to preserving urban parkland and therefore spent time working with the City of New York about an alternate location. This proposed location meets the EPA’s twin goals of cleaning up the canal while also protecting urban parkland.”
More than a dozen contaminants, including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PCBs and heavy metals such as mercury, lead and copper, were found at high levels in the sediment in the Gowanus Canal. PAHs and heavy metals were also found in the canal water. PAHs are a group of chemicals that are formed during the incomplete burning of coal, oil, gas, wood, garbage or other organic substances. PCBs were used as coolants and lubricants in transformers, capacitors and other electrical equipment, and their manufacture was banned in 1979. PCBs and PAHs are suspected of being cancer-causing and PCBs can have neurological effects, as well. To this day, people can still be found fishing in the Gowanus, despite advisories about not eating fish from the canal. In 2010, the Gowanus Canal was added to EPA’s Superfund list of the nation’s most contaminated hazardous waste sites.
The EPA’s cleanup plan requires that New York City construct two sewage and storm water retention tanks to significantly reduce CSO discharges from two key locations in the upper portion of the canal. These discharges are not being addressed by current New York City upgrades to the sewer system. Without these controls, contaminated sewage discharges would re-contaminate the canal after its cleanup. In its cleanup plan the EPA estimated that a reduction of 58% to 74% of these discharges will be needed to maintain the effectiveness of the cleanup, and the new tanks are being designed to achieve that goal.
The EPA issued its final cleanup plan for the Gowanus Canal Superfund site on September 27, 2013. The cleanup includes dredging contaminated sediment that has accumulated on the bottom of the canal as a result of industrial and sewer discharges. The dredged areas will be capped. The plan also includes controls to prevent combined sewer overflows, or CSOs, and other land-based sources of contamination from compromising the cleanup. Under administrative orders with the identified potentially responsible parties, the EPA is currently conducting and overseeing engineering design work needed for the site cleanup. The canal design work is expected to continue for another two years, followed by the start of cleanup operations, which the EPA expects will be initiated at the 4th Street basin and the top of the canal in 2019.
The EPA’s cleanup plan assumed possible locations for the two tanks, both owned by New York City -- the Thomas Greene Park location for the larger tank at the top of the canal and the Department of Sanitation salt storage lot located at 2nd Avenue and 5th Street for the smaller tank in the middle of the canal. The cleanup plan specified that the final locations would be determined during the design phase of the project. The EPA and New York City have already agreed that one tank, with a capacity of four million gallons, will be located at the Department of Sanitation salt storage lot.
For the larger eight million gallon tank at the top of the canal, New York City proposed as its preferred location two adjacent properties on Nevins Street between Butler and DeGraw Streets. The EPA and New York City agreed to locate the larger tank at this Head-of-Canal location. The agreement also requires the City to carry out actions to prepare that site for installation of the tank, including removal of
contaminated soil.
This site selection decision is contingent on New York City meeting certain conditions that have been detailed in the proposed agreement. If these conditions are not met within timeframes specified in the agreement, EPA can require New York City to design the tank for construction at the Thomas Greene Park location. Under the agreement, New York City will work concurrently on tank designs for both locations, as a contingency.
The agreement between EPA and New York City aims to avoid a potential permanent loss of parkland at the Thomas Greene Park. The park, which includes a swimming pool, is important to the community, with 40,000 visitors in 2015. The Head-of-Canal location is expected to provide additional open space in the community.
The EPA will hold a public meeting on April 25 at P.S. 32 located at 317 Hoyt St., Brooklyn, N.Y. at 6:30 p.m. to explain the work being secured under the agreement and is encouraging public comments. Comments will be accepted until May 16.
Additionally, comments can mailed or emailed to: Walter Mugdan, U.S. EPA Superfund Director 290 Broadway, Floor 19, New York, N.Y., 10007 mugdan.walter@epa.gov

To read the agreement between the EPA and New York City, please visit:
https://www3.epa.gov/region02/superfund/npl/gowanus/
or visit EPA’s document repository located at the Carroll Gardens Library at 396 Clinton St. in Brooklyn, New York.

The Environmental Protection Agency Region 2 just released the statement above regarding an agreement the Agency reached with New York City on the location of two sewage retention tanks that are an important part of the Superfund clean-up of the Gowanus Canal.

The tanks are combined sewer overflow (CSO) control measures meant to significantly reduce overall contaminated solid discharges to the Canal.

For months now, the EPA and the City have been negotiating the siting of the larger of the two tanks.
EPA Region 2 suggested placing the 8-million gallon tank underneath the Double D pool at Thomas Greene Park near Nevins Street. The Agency reasoned that the pool needs to be removed anyway because it sits on the former Brooklyn Union Gas Fulton Municipal Manufactured Gas Plant which needs to be remediated. Also, the parkland is already owned by the City, which would save the acquisition cost.

The NYC DEP, on the other hand, preferred to site the 8-million gallon tank on privately-owned land along the canal, adjacent to the park. The sites in question are 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street.
The City reasons that it wants the tanks in closer proximity to the rest of its Gowanus infrastructure at the head of the canal. It also wants to build a head-house for the mechanical elements related to the tank. The above ground head house envisioned by the City would take up 1/4 of Thomas Greene Park if built there, DEP argues. The neighborhood is already underserved as far as green spaces according to the City. Using the privately owned parcels would allow them to maintain the park as is and add additional parkland on those purchased parcels.

Building the tank on private land is not only going to cost the City substantially more money, it will also delay the entire Superfund clean-up by a minimum of four to five years as the city first needs to acquire the privately owned land, potentially through condemnation proceedings and potentially lengthy lawsuits if the owners refuse to sell.

At a community meeting in January, Region 2 Superfund Director Walter Mugdan admitted that, "the chunk of time [because of these legal proceedings] would be longer in almost all certainty than if the tank went to the park location."
It remains clear that EPA still sees the Park as the best location for the tank because the
location will save time and money.
"I still believe that is pretty accurate," Mugdan told the community in January. "Since the pool needs to be dismantled anyhow, it seems like a pretty logical location to put the CS0 tank.
In addition, today's statement on the agreement reached between the EPA and New York City leaves one important part out. The EPA team responsible for the environmental remediation design for Gowanus Canal Superfund has been clear that building the tanks on the City's preferred site immediately adjacent to the waterway creates some very difficult engineering challenges.

It appears that it all came down to the City being able to turn the potential loss of a portion of Thomas Greene Park into an environmental justice issue. that swayed EPA Region 2 Administrator Judith Enck into giving in to the City despite the advice of her own team.

Perhaps Enck should have been informed that the NYC Parks Department has described Thomas Greene Park as 'underutilized', that the City wanted to close the DD pool five years ago because of lack of funds, that the pool is only open two months out of the year now and that NYC was very much aware of the fact that there was liquid coal tar oozing under parts of the park because it had been built on a former MGP site and that it would, at one point, need to be remediated.

Sadly, the biggest environmental issue here may be that New York City, one of the parties responsible for polluting the Gowanus Canal in the first place, may be able to delay the Superfund clean-up.
But that, of course, is how our little 1.8 mile canal has been allowed to stay polluted for over 100 years.
Politics, at the end, always get in the way.

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Dear EPA Administrator McCarthy, Gowanus Needs Your Help! Why I Reached Out To Washington Regarding Our Polluted Canal

Looking at 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street from the Gowanus Canal Side

The Double D Pool at Thomas Greene Park

1928 photo of the former MGP site at Douglass Street, where Thomas Greene Park is now

242 Nevins Street

234 Butler Street

As a member of the Environmental Protection Agency Gowanus Canal Superfund Community Advisory Group (CAG), I am deeply disappointed by the latest twist in the long-promised environmental clean-up of our toxic waterway.

My disappointment is not with EPA's Region 2 team, which has been overseeing this particular Superfund project. Headed by Gowanus Canal Project Manager Christos Tsiamis, Legal Counsel  Brian Carr and Community Involvement Coordinator Natalie Loney, the team has worked tirelessly to move the project forward in record time for the good of local residents.
Rather, I am disturbed by the fact that politics, not science or engineering seem to have 'contaminated' the process. And I lay the blame squarely at the feet of Region 2 Regional Administrator Judith Enck, who appears to be disregarding her team's scientific findings and recommendations in order to accommodate the City of New York, one of the primary polluters of the Gowanus Canal.

These accommodations center around the siting of an 8-million gallon retention tank the EPA has ordered New York City's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to build as part the remedial design for the canal . The tank is a combined sewer overflow (CSO) control measure for the upper part of the canal meant to "significantly reduce overall contaminated solid discharges to the Canal."

EPA Region 2 has suggested placing the 8-million gallon tank underneath the Double D pool at Thomas Greene Park. The Agency reasoned that:
a)the park is already owned by the City, which would save the cost of acquiring land and
b)the site sits on top of the former Brooklyn Union Gas Fulton Municipal Manufactured Gas Plant and needs to be environmentally remediated by National Grid.

This, according to Region 2, would create "a synergy between programs that potentially could save time in Site acquisition and permitting and save significant construction costs."

New York City, however, wants to place the tank on two privately owned sites, 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street, located directly across from the park.  Those sites would need to be acquired by eminent domain, a lengthy legal process that may take 5 years.  The acquisition would cost tax payers upwards of 100 million dollars.
To justify its plan, NYC DEP insists it needs to build a larger than necessary head-house for the mechanicals related to the tank.  Mostly, the City claims that the temporary loss of the Double D Pool and the park space needed for the tank, if it were to be built at Thomas Greene Park, would constitute an environmental justice issue since the community, which include many NYCHA residents, are underserved as far as parkland.

Regional Administrator Enck, a political appointee,  seems to have fully bought into this environmental justice issue.  She contacted me  after I published a post on a recent CAG meeting, in which I suggested that her final decision on this matter may come down to politics, rather than science.  

She obviously did not like the post.  She began the conversation by telling me that, as a journalist, I should have reached out to her personally before publishing it.  ( I had reached out to her in a letter weeks before urging her to listen to her own team of scientists and engineers but she ignored my correspondence.  I also pointed out that I have never claimed to be a journalist, just a member of the community who writes a neighborhood blog.)

Enck insisted that her final decision regarding the siting of the tank will take the City's claim of environmental justice issue into account. "We take the loss of parkland very seriously", she told me.
I pointed out that, in 2010, the City had been all too willing to close the Double D pool to save money and had not seemed too concerned about the loss of such an amenity for NYCHA residents then.

I also reminded her that the biggest environmental justice issue was the liquid coal tar underneath the pool. The community certainly understands that the temporary loss of an amenity that is only open for several weeks each summer would be offset by the removal of toxic material and a cleaner environment

During our conversation, I mentioned the offer by private developer Alloy to donate free parkland to the City in exchange for dropping its eminent domain plans for the privately owned sites at the head of the canal. Enck seemed dismissive of the offer. "Developers come and go", she told me.

A final agreement between EPA Region 2 and New York City is forthcoming in the next few weeks.

Only then will we know if Judith Enck has given in to the City's thinly veiled attempts to delay taking responsibility for dumping millions of gallons of raw sewage into our open waterway. 

If the presentation at the last CAG meeting in January was any indication, she is making decisions that put the City, not the EPA in control of the Superfund clean-up timetable.

That is why I recently reached out to  EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy in Washington.  I believe that  once again, the Gowanus community is being shortchanged and that we need to come together to fight for a clean environment. Because, in Gowanus, getting rid of raw sewage, liquid tar and PCPs  should be the only environmental justice issue Judith Enck should care about.
Hopefully, Washington can and will remind her of this.

Here is my letter to Administrator McCarthy. Perhaps you may want to write your own?

Dear EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy,

I am reaching out to you today because my community needs your help to keep the clean-up of the Gowanus Canal on track.

I live three blocks away from the heavily polluted Gowanus Canal and have spent the past five years serving as a Gowanus Canal Superfund Community Advisory Group member. I am also a community blogger, keeping my neighbors informed on matters related to the canal.

I have had the great pleasure of interacting with the Region Two team responsible for the clean-up. Walter Mugdan, Christos Tsiamis, Brian Carr and Natalie Loney have been nothing but transparent and available to the community. Their hard work has earned them the trust of local residents.

There are strong indications, however, that the team's efforts are being undermined by EPA Region 2 Administrator Judith Enck, who appears to be allowing politics to overshadow the Gowanus Superfund process. Against the advice of her team, she is allowing the City of New York (a PRP) to delay the timeline set forth by Region 2. More disturbingly, the delay may lead to the recontamination of our canal after remediation, something that no resident is in support of.

The community is frankly disheartened by Administrator Enck's refusal to let science and engineering dictate the process. Instead, she seems more eager to accommodate the City of New York, which, after 150 years, continues to contribute significantly to the pollution in the canal.

One can certainly see parallels between Gowanus and recent events in Flint, Michigan. The EPA is the last hope for many communities that have been exposed to environmental hazards caused by their own local governments. When politics influence EPA's decisions, there simply is nowhere else for citizens to turn.

I urge you to remind Region 2 Administrator Enck that science and engineering should guide her decisions, not political maneuvering by a PRP.
Please uphold the principals of the EPA and re-assure the people of Gowanus that their trust in your agency is well placed.

With regards,
Katia Kelly

My friend, author and fellow CAG member Joseph Alexiou, just wrote eloquently on this issue for Curbed.

Click here for his wonderfully written article.

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Developer Alloy Suggests Idea That May Solve Delay Issue And Park Loss Associated With Siting Of Combined Sewer Overflow Tank In Gowanus

At last night's Gowanus Canal Superfund Community Advisory Committee meeting


Jared Della Valle, President of Alloy

Councilmember Steve Levin

Kevin Jeffreys, Brooklyn Parks Commissioner

Eric Landau, DEP Associate Commissioner

Looking at 234 Butler Street and 242 Nevins Street from the Gowanus Canal Side

The Double D Pool at Thomas Greene Park

1928 photo of the former MGP site at Douglass Street, where Thomas Greene Park is now

The park, surrounded by industry, as seen from 4th Avenue 

looking towards the Gowanus Canal in the 1930s.

Alloy Presentation

The discussion of where New York City should be siting the larger of two Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) retention tanks that the US Environmental Protection Agency has ordered New York City Department Of Environmental Protection  (DEP) to construct in Gowanus to capture raw sewage currently being discharged into the canal  has just become a whole lot more interesting.

You may remember that EPA's Region 2, responsible for overseeing the Gowanus Superfund clean-up,  has suggested placing a 8-million gallon tank underneath the Double D pool at Thomas Greene Park. The Federal agency reasoned that  the site is already owned by the City, which would save the cost of acquiring land. In addition, the park sits on top of the former Brooklyn Union Gas Fulton  Municipal Manufactured Gas Plant (MGP) which was in operation at this location from 1879 to the early 1930s. Since coal tar is currently oozing under the pool area and flows towards the Gowanus Canal, National Grid, the party responsible for the environmental clean-up, has been asked by EPA to dig up the pool so that the source contamination can be removed. By working in tandem with National Grid, DEP would save money and time. 

The NYC DEP, on the other hand, would prefer to site the 8-million gallon tank on privately owned land along the canal, adjacent to the park.  The sites in question are 234 Butler  Street and  242 Nevins Street.  In addition, the City wants to acquire 270 Nevins Street, which is currently occupied by Eastern Effects Studios, as a staging area.  The City is willing to make use of Eminent Domain to acquire the three  properties if the private owners are unwilling to sell. The necessary legal proceedings involved in making this happen will take time and millions of dollars.

The City wants to place the tank and a 50 feet high head house for the mechanical elements needed for the tank at 234 Butler and  242 Nevins partly because of the proximity to the rest of its Gowanus infrastructure at the head of the canal, and partly to "protect Thomas Greene Park" since the nearby community is underserved when it comes to open space and recreational facilities.

The problem with the City's eminent domain plan is that it will delay the environmental clean up of the Gowanus Canal by about 3 to 5 years, which EPA is very concerned about.

Intriguingly enough,  Alloy, a real estate development firm based in Dumbo, has proposed an alternative solution that may reduce or eliminate the clean-up  delay as well as offset the loss of parkland.

At last night's EPA Gowanus Canal Superfund Community Advisory Group meeting,  Alloy told the community that it had recently signed a binding agreement on a 99 year lease for 234 Butler Street and has been in talks with the owners of 242 Nevins Street,

Alloy is proposing to build an as-of-right commercial development with a 2.0 Floor Area Ratio (FAR)   that will provide much needed creative office space in Gowanus.  Distributing the allowable square footage into two four-story buildings instead of one large two-story structure  would allow Alloy and  the owners of the sites to donate a sizable piece of land to the City. 

According to Jared Della Valle, Alloy's president,  the donation would create additional permanent park land that would exceed the land lost to the head house in the park, if it were placed there.
It would also preserve the properties' tax base and create jobs in the area.

"We believe that our proposal could save the unnecessary time of pursuing eminent domain"Della Valle explained to the Community Advisory Group. "It would also save the City up to a hundred million dollars."

What do Alloy and the owners get out of it?  "No eminent domain. It's that simple," Della Valle said. 

To those who may think that the offer of a land donation to the city is too good to be true, he points out that his firm is confident that there is enough margin to make their project viable even with giving away land.  He believes that Alloy can add some new perspective and help create a meaningful dialog between the parties. "We are offering a resource in this game," Della Valle concluded.

One could imagine that NYC DEP would jump at this chance, but no.  Eric Landau, DEP's Associate Commissioner and Kevin Jeffreys, Brooklyn Parks Commissioner, also attended last night's CAG meeting.  During their presentation to the community, they seemed eager to point out that the'City's recommendation remains unchanged and that it is still pursuing eminent domain.

"It is a very intriguing idea", Jeffreys said about Alloy's proposal, " but it does not eliminate all of the City's concerns. We want to make sure that we do not reduce the current footprint of Thomas Greene Park."  

According to Jeffreys, a head house, if it were built in Thomas Greene Park,  would take up about 29,000 to 30,000 square feet of the total 110,000 s.f. park area. "If you place it in Thomas Green Park, you interrupt the current park program" he stated.  He stated that the land donation proposed by Alloy would only give the City a "marginal increase in park land." (57,000 sf.)

The City's plan would add approximately 75,000 sq ft of open space.

Eric Landau mentioned that construction of tank and head house in the park would take about 8 to 10 years, during which the park would have to remain closed versus 4 years if constructed on the privately owned land.
(One may want to point out here that the EPA estimates that the entire Superfund clean-up will take 12 years. Why it would take the City 8 years to build a pretty straight forward tank is anyone's guess.)

The community reacted with skepticism towards the City, which has been named the # 2 responsible polluter of the Gowanus Canal by EPA.  The City, unfortunately, has been less than transparent in regards to Gowanus.  Landau addressed the deep distrust from the community. "I get that we have a historic credibility problem in the community."  He was quick to blame the previous administration.

Most members of the CAG seemed to be opposed  to any solution that would entail the taking of private land by eminent domain.  There was a genuine interest in the possibilities and solution put forth by Alloy.  One member of the CAG told the City representatives to "get back to the table with Alloy to make it work."  Another member felt that the city had a 'predetermined design' for the tank and for the head house and was failing to embrace more creative solutions that could take care of all concerns.

The sentiment against the City was best expressed by a Gowanus  NYCHA resident, who said: "Right now, the City does not have the money to support public housing.  These people [meaning Alloy] are coming in to give you land versus going to court to do eminent domain. I don't understand going to court because it is going to take money and time to do this." She felt that the money could be better spent on public housing.

Indeed, it is hard to believe that the City is willing to spend $100 + million dollars on the purchase of land and legal wrangling, when there seems to be a perfectly sensible alternative that would increase the overall existing parkland AND keep the Superfund clean-up on schedule.

Sticking to EPA's clean-up timetable is what most CAG members want most. After both the Alloy and DEP presentations, CAG members voted on a resolution urging the EPA, which will have final say regarding the location and design of the required sewage detention tanks, "to make their institutional decisions based on the best recommendations of their project design team and engineers."

You can access Alloy's complete presentation to the CAG here.

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