Glendale residents raise concerns of soil contamination from Superfund site.

 

QNS


State agencies briefed the public on Monday about a Glendale superfund site that will have another round of remediations in the near future after the toxic PCE has been determined to be no detriment to public health.

The Department of Environmental Conservation and the Department of Health held a meeting on March 11 in a small room of the North Forest Park library where residents complained that they were not properly notified of the contaminants beneath the soil in their community.

But DEC claimed there was little chance the public could be breathing the chemical since it is deep underground and a study of 10 homes in 2006 showed no sign of PCE in the air – an admittedly small size – but that 30 year project would flush the soil of the contaminant.

“We should have had flyers coming to our house, we should have been informed by you people,” one attendee said. “Nothing.”

This is why there’s nobody here tonight, nobody knows,” another person said, with many attributing QNS for learning about the meeting.

With most of the contamination up to 100 feet below the surface at the deepest parts, DOH does not consider soil vapor intrusion to be an issue for a few reasons: because although the PCE is concentrated in the ground water, there is a layer of clean water between the chemical and the surface; homes are not at risk because the foundations, unless there are crack in the pavement, will seal out the vapors; and there is no risk of people ingesting PCE because the surrounding communities are on the municipal system which is supplied from upstate.

But Robert Nardella, 78, however, maintained concern about his home after the presentation because of the claim by DEC that the underground plume had migrated west at a shallower level and pointed out that some residents may have dug wells on their property over the years as a means to water their lawn or fill above-ground pools to get around water restrictions.

“Why is it being addressed again?” Nardella told QNS. “I was confused as to why this is coming up again when they did everything to minimize our concerns, you know, saying there was no more vapor and that it’s going deeper and deeper into the ground.”


Nardella was also concerned about his home, which was built in the early 1930s which just have wood floors over dirt in the basement, offering no protection from possible soil vapor intrusion.
“There are still many homes next to that site that have dirt over a wood floor, mine included,” Nardella added. “If there are any vapors coming up, I don’t have any protection.”

Councilman Holden's bill for mandatory lead inspection and prevention passes.

 Queens Chronicle

 
Last April, Councilman Bob Holden (D-Middle Village) held a red flag and declared a CAC Industries lot a “red flag site” after learning that a sewer main project in Middle Village was stalled late in 2017 after high levels of lead were found in the soil.

On Wednesday, Int. 1063 passed the City Council, which requires any city development to provide notice to the relevant Council member and community board within five business days of discovering or becoming aware of a hazardous level of lead in soil.

The bill is Holden’s first to pass in the City Council.

“Increased transparency between city agencies and the public is a value that I campaigned on and I’m pleased to see this bill accomplishing that,” he said in a statement.

The soil that had been excavated during the Penelope Avenue sewer work was sitting in a yard leased by CAC Industries across the street from PS/IS 128, a K-8 school. The dirt had been sitting uncovered at the site until a tarp was eventually placed over the mounds.

In April, Holden took aim at the Department of Design and Construction, saying, “If they knew this was contaminated, to leave it uncovered is criminal. To leave it uncovered across from a school is more criminal.”

The discovery about the soil was made after CAC Industries, the project’s contractor, tried to bring the dirt to a dump but management there declined to take it after a visual inspection.

Testing revealed lead levels in the dirt mounds between 300 and 600 parts per million, exceeding the federal limit for bare soil where children play.

Eventually, the soil was removed and relocated to a facility in New Jersey.

 “It is common sense that local officials should be notified of any dangerous contamination so they can help inform and protect their constituents,” Holden said in his statement. “There is no excuse for carelessness that this bill will correct.”

Other bills in the package address lead-based paint hazards, lead testing in water, blood lead screenings, childhood lead poisoning prevention and the availability of lead hazard testing.

Be careful who you hire to build a house

From NJ, but relevant:


From Eyewitness News:

A dream home became a nightmare in Florham Park, New Jersey.

When the homeowner was handed over the keys he suddenly learned his new home was sinking, cracking, and crumbling.

"I spent all the money I had and I was cleaned out. I have nothing now," said Humayun Akhtar. He thought he was building his wife the home of her dreams, a gleaming palace where they'd live together.

But nearly a decade later, they've never spent a night here.

"Look at this, won't even close," he said at the bathroom door.

Weeks after closing, the cracks started to form, and he soon found he'd sunk his life savings into a house that was sinking into the ground.

City cleaning up future South Jamaica hotel site

From the Queens Chronicle:

The city Office of Environmental Remediation is preparing to clean up the site where a four-story hotel will be built.

The office is proposing to take several steps to remediate the site at 132-10 149 Ave. in South Jamaica, including the excavation of soil and the installation of a vapor barrier system.

It also plans to place a 30-inch thick concrete slab underneath the building to “prevent human exposure to residual soil/fill remaining under the site.”

The site requires environmental remediation because the city found “volatile organic compounds, pesticides, PCBs and metals” in the soil where the hotel will be located.

Why are we still building hotels when the ones we already have are being repurposed as homeless shelters? Oh, I think I just answered my own question.

Catch basins clogged up

From NY1:

Rockaway residents who live on Shorefront Parkway, located just feet from the ocean, are concerned there are too many catch basins or storm drains covered in weeds and packed with dirt.

"We're already compromised in terms of being on the waterfront, so I can't imagine the water has a place to go," said Marie Raico, a concerned resident.

Longtime Rockaway resident Dan Brown says after taking his own inventory of the clogged catch basins, he was startled at what he found.

"There were some that were unrecognizable, I had to dig to find them," he said.

Some residents say it didn't take Hurricane Sandy to overwhelm the drains. They say average rainstorms can mean flooding.

"What happens is the water goes down and goes into that stairwell. Down there we have all of our electric. We have boilers, we have hot our water tanks," said Ray Watson, a concerned resident.

Residents say they have called 311 but feel like they're just getting the run around.

Digging for missing mafia members

From DNAinfo:

The FBI began digging for a body Monday in the former Queens home of notorious mob power James “Jimmy The Gent” Burke, who was famously portrayed by Robert De Niro in the movie "Goodfellas," sources told DNAinfo New York.

FBI Evidence Collection specialists and agents from the Organized Crime Division descended into the basement of Burke’s family home at 81-48 102 Rd. in South Ozone Park about 8 a.m. armed with jackhammers and sledge hammers.

Sources said the feds recently obtained information from a new cooperating informant linked to the Gambino and Bonanno crime families who told them he believed a hood who disappeared decades ago was buried in Burke’s basement or backyard.

The sources say the dig is not related to the fabled 1978 Lufthansa Heist, where Burke, portrayed as Jimmy Conway by De Niro in "Goodfellas," and his fellow wiseguys pulled off an $8 million robbery at JFK, which at the time was the largest robbery in history and was featured in the film.

Many of the suspects eventually were murdered.

Only the body of Burke's closest friend, Thomas DeSimone, who was played by actor Joe Pesci, has never been found, but sources say they are not looking for his remains at Burke’s home.

Looks like Jimmy the Gent had an illegal conversion in his cellar.

Ozone Park soil contamination to be removed

From the Queens Chronicle:

Work started this week on the controversial project to remove toxic chemicals from a former industrial site in Ozone Park.

The work along 100th Street between 101st and 103rd avenues will clean eight bays under the former Ozone Park LIRR station that were once used for storage by Ozone Industries, an aircraft parts manufacturer that operated out of an adjacent factory until the late 1990s.

Ozone Industries placed drums in the ground below the bays that contained a chemical called trichloroethylene, or TCE, a substance linked to some forms of cancer and problems of the central nervous system. The chemical is used in aircraft manufacturing.

For the past decade, End Zone, the successor company to Ozone Industries, has been working with the city and the state to remediate TCE contamination. The eight bays where the work will be done has been labeled a state Superfund site.

John Durnin, a representative from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, spoke to Community Board 9 about the status of the project that had been scheduled to begin last month. Durnin did not say what caused the delay, but did detail what kind of work will be done.

He said the concrete floor of the bays will be removed and the soil will be excavated.

“The contamination is in the soil,” Durnin explained. “It will be trucked away in sealed trucks.”

Air monitors will be placed around the site and workers will be assigned to shifts to make sure no dangerous level of the chemical is recorded.

“The work is going to be done inside the closed bays,” Durnin said. “There will be no outside work done. The contaminated soil will not be exposed.”

Some of the contamination will be vented into the air, but only trace amounts that the DEC says is not dangerous.

Of course not.

Concern over cleanup under the "Queensway"

From the Queens Courier:

The cleanup of polluted soil in Ozone Park has some residents worried toxic chemicals have spread throughout the neighborhood.

End Zone Industries will begin a long-awaited project to remove just a few inches of tainted soil from under eight storage bays under the abandoned Rockaway Beach LIRR line. The bays are between 101st and 103rd Avenues, from north to south, and 99th to 100th Streets, east to west.

Company representatives briefed Community Board 9 about the project at its April 9 meeting – with some board members upset about the project.

...concerns over a spread chemical, Trichloroethylene (TCE), business disruption and other concerns had board members skeptical about the project. TCE is an organic chemical that’s been used in cleaning solvents, paint thinner and pepper spray, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Dr. Vincent Evangelista, whose podiatry office is nearby the cleanup, expressed concern over the TCE-tainted brown water about 30 feet under the surface. Evangelista asked Austin and End Zone representatives if the contaminated soil, deemed by End Zone to be non-hazardous, immediately stopped outside of the allotted bays.

Austin acknowledged the soil could have spread to other parts of the neighborhood, but most of it has not been tested.

“There’s always unknowns when you dig underground and into dirt,” he said.

Paul Vallone continues to deny his past as a lobbyist

From the Times Ledger:

Community Board 7 is asking the state attorney general to investigate how unauthorized soil was dumped on a waterfront lot in Whitestone where a luxury housing development is planned, TimesLedger Newspapers has learned.

The board sent a Feb. 20 letter to Attorney General Eric Schneiderman requesting a probe into whether or not toxic material was illegally transported to the 13-acre vacant site, known as Waterpointe, where the construction of 52 homes is planned.

That soil was transported under the auspices of Massachusetts-based consulting company EBI Consulting and Whitestone-based contractor Barone Management. The two companies were cleaning the site of historic contamination as part of the state Brownfield Cleanup Program, in which private companies get financial incentives to clean sites following state Department of Environmental Conservation regulations.

The board has had several committee meetings with all concerned parties. CB 7 members Chuck Apelian and James Cervino had recused themselves from making any decisions about the process. Apelian said he had prior business relationships involving the site, and Cervino’s company was hired to import untouched soil to replace the contaminated earth. None of Cervino’s soil was questioned by the DEC.

Paul Vallone, a board member and City Council candidate, also has loose ties to the property. He is a partner in his family law firm, Vallone & Vallone, and is sometimes listed in city lobbyist databases as working for Constantinople & Vallone Consulting LLC, which was hired by the previous owners of Waterpointe in 2006 to lobby the city about the zoning of the property.

Vallone said his name is sometimes listed as a lobbyist as a technicality, since he works at the family law firm, and that he has never worked at his father’s consulting firm.

“My name has nothing to do with this project,” he said.


Ok, we went through this 4 years ago, and chrome dome still hasn't gotten it through his thick skull that no one buys his B.S. on this subject. Pictured above are the partners in the Vallone law firm. Peter Vallone, Jr. is a member of the firm. He is not registered as a lobbyist. Is he breaking the law? I doubt it. The explanation proffered by Paul has been proven to be nonsense, yet he continues to stick with it. Do you really want someone with this level of dishonesty and intellect representing you in the City Council? He's running in District 19, not 30.

Contaminated Whitestone soil came from Brooklyn

From the Times Ledger:

Months after a state agency fined two companies working on a brownfield site in Whitestone for importing unauthorized soil onto the property where a high-end residential development is planned, TimesLedger Newspapers has learned that some of the soil in question came from a former Superfund site.

The property in question is called Waterpointe, a proposed development of expensive homes near the corner of 6th Road and 151st Place.

...well before Edgestone acquired the property, additional soil was dumped on top of the DEC-approved material under Barone and EBI’s watch. This eventually led the agency to fine the two companies a total of $150,000, half of which will be nixed if the problems are corrected, and prompted a cleanup of the unauthorized material. Some of that material included soil from a former electroplating facility in Brooklyn, Gordon said Tuesday night.

Documents obtained from the DEC via a Freedom of Information Law request showed that the soil she was referring to came from 154 N. 7th St. in Brooklyn.

That is the same address where in 1997 a company called All Plating Corp. was abandoned and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency later cleaned up leaking hazardous materials under its Superfund program, according to the EPA. A Superfund site is a hazardous waste site that poses harm to surrounding communities and is cleaned up under the EPA.

In two instances, Barone told TimesLedger Newspapers that the fine from DEC and subsequent required cleanup were due to a paperwork error. In essence, Barone Management and EBI did not do enough testing on the material it brought in to satisfy DEC requirements, he said.

A new environmental company overseeing the site estimated that removing the unauthorized material would take between weeks and months and would cost at least about $500,000.

Brownfields not actually tested post-Sandy

From the NY Post:

For more than a month, the Environmental Protection Agency has said Hurricane Sandy did not cause significant problems at any of the 247 Superfund toxic-waste sites it’s monitoring in New York and New Jersey.

But in many cases, no actual tests of soil or water — just visual inspections — are being conducted.

The EPA conducted a few tests right after the storm, but a spokesman couldn’t provide details or locations of any recent testing when asked last week.

The 1980 Superfund law gave the EPA the power to order cleanups of abandoned, spilled and illegally dumped hazardous wastes, such as the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn.

“The EPA and the state of New Jersey have not done due diligence to make sure these sites have not created problems,” said Jeff Tittel, director of the Sierra Club in New Jersey.