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From the Berkshire Eagle interview with Bryan Olsen 4/20/20
Sampling at Allendale School has been ongoing since 2000, but beginning in 2006, there has been a significant increase in sampling. A summary of sampling efforts at Allendale School between 2006 the present includes:
- Soil sampling in the playground area—all 20 sample results were less than 0.1 part per million (ppm), well below EPA and Mass DEP standards;
- PCB air sampling—over 160 air samples since 2007, with all results below EPA risk-based screening concentrations;
- Groundwater monitoring—with results confirming that groundwater flows away from the School and PCB concentrations in the wells located between the school and the landfills are all well below relevant standards;
- Monitoring conducted by Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH): In 2006, Mass DPH conducted extensive testing for PCBs both inside and outside of the school. This included air samples, wipe samples (e.g., dust on a surface), carpet dust, vacuum bag dust, and unit ventilator samples. The samples were analyzed by three different labs, including one recommended by HRI. In addition, Mass DPH conducted blood serum sampling for both adults and children. Mass DPH concluded:
“Specifically, based on the Department’s evaluation of indoor environmental testing and blood samples analyzed for serum PCB level, the MDPH/BEH determined that results did not appear to reveal unusual opportunities for PCB exposures to the Allendale School community and that levels reported for indoor air in the school were below health-based screening values. Results of the blood serum testing for all adults and children who participated generally show low PCB levels. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reviewed the data as well and concluded that the serum testing results were low and PCB congener patterns were consistent with data seen in the general population.’
- The full report is available here.
Below was last updated in 2006
The U.S. Federal Courts have ordered GE to remove its PCBs from at least part of the Housatonic River in Pittsfield and to outline a plan for removal of PCBs from the rest of the river. So when you dredge PCBs from the river, where do you put those toxic chemicals? If you’re GE, you put them next to an elementary school. The two toxic waste dumps are called Building 71 and Hill 78. (Building 71 gets its name from the GE building that was once on the site.) One of the two dumps is just 50 feet from the school’s athletic field. GE workers have been seen at the dumps (2006) wearing white space suits and masks while just downwind, students train on the nearby running track.
| Arrow #1: High-level toxic waste dump called "Building 71" (former site of GE building 71) Arrow #2: Active toxic waste dump called "Hill 78" (former site of GE building 78) Arrow #3: Allendale Elementary School and athletic field (next to two toxic waste dumps) |
Pittsfield Pediatricians Protest PCBs(3/7/2006)
Filters that were to be jointly tested, thrown away (3/2/2006)
Mass. Dept. Public Health met with Advisory Group (12/22/05
State Department of Public Health to come to Pittsfield (12/17/2005)
Mass. Department of Public Health found no PCBs – but HRI did! (12/07/2005)
PCB Health Effects Forum 12/12/05
The Basics
In October of 2000, many parties including the City of Pittsfield and the General Electric company entered into a legal agreement called a Consent Decree. This legal agreement specified the procedures and guidelines that would constrain how the Housatonic River and lands polluted with PCBs would be handled during the cleanup. One of the major problems with the Consent Decree is that it did not demand that the cleanup start at the point farthest upstream. Unkamet Brook, where it flows through the GE plant area, is a HIGHLY contaminated swamp that was used by GE as a dumping ground for all sorts of toxic waste. Unkamet Brook runs into the Housatonic River upstream of the entire “clean up” that has been done so far. This ensures re-contamination of the “cleaned” river.
The Consent Decree also allowed GE to leave a heavily polluted dumping area in place next to the river. Starting in the early 1940s, GE used this site to dump all manner of toxics. As the first phase of the cleanup began, GE added material removed from the river to this hill of toxic material – Hill 78. GE also added construction debris from the demolition of contaminated GE buildings. In effect, the dumping of PCBs and other contamination onto Hill 78 ensured that we will never know what was in the original waste dump on which Hill 78 was built. We are left with rumors that can’t be investigated. We don’t even know how deep below ground the original dump went. (Hill 78 and Building 71 are sometimes called On-Plant Consolidation Areas or OPCA’s)
Hill 78 is now an unlined landfill onto which GE dumped its PCB waste from the first phase of the river cleanup. It was filled to capacity in 2009 and a cap was placed over it. It now covers 6 acres and rise more than 35′ above the Allendale Elementary School playground from which it is 50 feet. How far away from an elementary school would you have to site a landfill if you were siting it today? For a site that does NOT accept toxic waste, the minimum distance is 1,000 feet, but common sense and a sense of civic responsibility should have told GE that this was not a wise siting choice for a toxic waste dump.
The other dump next to the school is called Building 71 even though it’s not a building. It is the former site of GE’s Building 71. It is also a High Level toxic waste dump that covers 5 acres. It was filled to capacity in 2006, and a cap was placed over it. Where Hill 78 received waste containing less than 50 parts per million PCBs, Building 71 had no such limit. There is a plastic liner under Building 71, and this liner collects toxic water that comes from the sludge above. The accumulating toxic soup that collects in the liner at the bottom of the pile requires periodic pumping. Moisture from the sludge passes through the toxic hill like water passing through coffee grounds, until it finally settles in the liner and is now called leachate. The table shows the amounts of leachate pumped from the liner of Building 71 over the three years between 2003 and 2005 according to GE’s monthly reports.
| MONTH | ||||
| JANUARY | 50,000 | 35,000 | 136,000 | 5,580 |
| FEBRUARY | 30,000 | 30,000 | 116,500 | 5,800 |
| MARCH | 120,000 | 98,000 | 174,500 | 6,000 |
| APRIL | 100,000 | 107,000 | 192,000 | 0 |
| MAY | 68,000 | 164,000 | 89,500 | 4,968 |
| JUNE | 65,000 | 147,500 | 130,000 | 4,100 |
| JULY | 53,000 | 171,000 | 127,500 | 0 |
| AUGUST | 122,500 | 214,000 | 55,000 | |
| SEPTEMBER | 94,000 | 230,000 | 55,000 | |
| OCTOBER | 84,000 | 177,000 | 378,000 | |
| NOVEMBER | 86,000 | 138,000 | 162,000 | |
| DECEMBER | 102,000 | 146,000 | ||
| TOTALS | 975,500 | 1,657,500 | 1,616,500 | 26,448 (partial year) |
The Allendale Elementary School itself was built on top of contaminated fill. GE gave away tons of PCB-contaminated fill to the city and to local residents without telling them of the dangers involved. In the early 1990s, Ge was required to “cap” the school yard. Later, in 1999, they were required to remove and replace contaminated fill throughout the entire school yard. In 2007, soil sampling required by the Consent Decree revealed high levels of PCBs were still in the soil just outside the schoolyard fence. This prompted EPA to do further testing inside the schoolyard fence. These tests showed PCBs at levels as high as 33 ppm in the top 1-3 feet. EPA required GE to remove all the soil down to a depth of 6 feet deep around the high level sample. Now it turns out there are dirt crawl spaces under the school and that these areas were not cleaned. The crawl spaces have trap doors that lead up to the classrooms and hallways.
Aerial Photo Comparison BEAT asked EPA why they believe that all the other areas around Allendale School, that had not previously had soil removed, did not contain high levels of PCBs. EPA’s answer was that they looked at maps of pre and post 1950s. The area that is now to be removed appears to have been low lying – sort of like a trench, that in later photos appears to have been filled in. The other areas of the school yard that have not had soil removed, did not appear to have changed in a similar way.BEAT suggested that a good project to figure out where in Pittsfield should be tested for PCBs would be to have someone examine aerial photos pre and post 1950 to look for low lying areas that are then filled in. The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection contacted us to say that they have done this and would BEAT like to find out more about what was actually done. Yes! We will discuss this with the DEP.
EPA’s Allendale Elementary School website.
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Pittsfield’s Pediatricians Protest PCB Dumps Next To Allendale Elementary School All eleven of Pittsfield’s pediatricians signed a letter to Mayor James M. Ruberto urging him and the community to speak out against two PCB dumps that sit next to Allendale Elementary School. The dumps, one lined and one unlined, have been filled with contaminated soil and sediment taken from contaminated areas around Pittsfield and the Housatonic River.
Filters that were to be jointly tested, were thrown away (3/2/2006)
Berkshire Environmental Action Team and Housatonic River Initiative suggested to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health that one way to assess the air quality within Allendale Elementary School would be to test the air filters in the school. If there were PCBs in the air in the school, a test of the school’s air filters would indicate that. The Director of the Pittsfield Board of Health, Dr. Philip Adamo, and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) assured the public that the air filters at Allendale Elementary School would be saved so that both the DPH’s lab and the lab preferred by BEAT, HRI, and Housatonic Environmental Action League could each run independent tests on the same filters using the same protocols and procedures. This agreement was made after filters that HRI obtained and tested showed PCBs, while those that DPH tested showed none. This new test would be a way to resolve the issue.
According to an article in the Berkshire Eagle, Superintendent of Schools Katherine E. Darlington said that the air filters inside the school were supposed to be changed in December, and that school custodians changed them during school vacation last week as part of their regular maintenance. The custodians discarded the filters. “It was part of the routine maintenance that was going to be done,” Darlington said.
David Martindale of California Avenue, whose daughter attends Allendale, said he was both “angry” and “incensed” that the air filters had been disposed of. “This is a travesty,” he said. “Everybody talks about data, and now the last piece has been thrown out. It seems very convenient that this happened. It’s not like it was a big secret that we didn’t want the filters changed.”
School staff members known as the “Allendale Safety Committee” released a written statement yesterday expressing their frustration at the most recent turn of events.
“We are frustrated and disturbed by the lack of communication between our city officials and state agencies,” the committee’s statement read. “There is no one person overseeing the PCB issue at Allendale school. As a result, different groups are unaware of what others are doing.
Massachusetts Department of Public Health meeting with Housatonic River Health Advisory Committee
Thursday, December 22, 2005, the Mass. Department of Public Health (DPH) held a meeting with the Housatonic River Area Advisory Group in the little meeting room upstairs in the Pittsfield Library. The DPH refused to move the meeting to the auditorium. The room was very full, but everyone who wanted to attend could fit.
BEAT had been trying to find out the date, time, and place that the Mass. Department of Public Health (MDPH) would be meeting out here. First we were told that MDPH would be meeting with the Housatonic River Health Advisory Committee and they would decide on when to have a meeting to talk with “parents, teachers, and other folks with concerns”. They would let BEAT know when that public meeting was scheduled. BEAT replied that under Mass. Open Meeting Law, the meeting with MDPH and the Housatonic River Advisory Committee IS a public meeting. The public may not be invited to talk, but we can listen – and where and when would the meeting take place? BEAT received an answer that “Of course, periodically folks who are not actual members do attend.”
On December 21, BEAT received official word that this meeting would be on the following day. The Housatonic Environmental Action League of CT (HEAL) pointed out that legally this meeting needed to be posted for 48 hours. HEAL has other commitments and cannot attend.
As far as we can determine, this group is supposed to meet quarterly. The last time they actually met was two years ago – on December 21.
This is not how our government should operate.
State Department of Public Health finally agrees to come to Pittsfield
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health, who were supposed to be meeting with Berkshire County residents quarterly, has finally agreed to come to Pittsfield. However, they now want to restrict who can come to that meeting.
Part of the reason BEAT was founded was to force our government to be transparent and accountable. That is why we try to videotape and broadcast so many meetings. BEAT believes that this very important meeting should be open to the public and should be videotaped and broadcast.
BEAT finds it incredible that the people who are well informed on this issue and have been asking for such data as the detection limits used in the allendale School PCB tests, could be excluded from this meeting. Actually they cannot legally exclude the public from this meeting according to the Open Meeting Law.
BEAT has been asking for information on how these tests were performed since Dec. 8 from both the Pittsfield Health Department, including Dr. Adamo, and the state Health Department. We have received NO ANSWER from the Pittsfield Health Department nor Dr. Adamo. The state would not give us answers by email or phone, but said they put it in the mail a week ago. We have not received anything. [received Dec. 23, 2005 ]
This is not how our government should operate.
From the Berkshire Eagle article:
Dr. Philip Adamo, chairman of Pittsfield’s Board of Health, said he wants to arrange a face-to-face meeting between the DPH and the Allendale community. He said parents and teachers should be able to pose questions and air concerns directly to the scientists who tested the air in the school.
Adamo said he wants that meeting to exclude outside groups, like the Housatonic River Initiative, that he said “have another agenda.” He criticized an environmentalist meeting on Dec. 12 at which an activist called on parents to pull their children out of Allendale until either the dump or the school has been moved.
Mass. Department of Public Health found no PCBs – but HRI did! – 12/2005
In a very bizarre situation, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) came to Allendale School and took air, dust, and filter samples to test for PCBs. (Berkshire Eagle story) At first they were only going to do their routine tests – not for PCBs – to make the teachers, parents, and students feel safe, but when the public found out that DPH did not intent to test for PCBs they objected. DPH agreed to test for PCBs. The some teachers, including a science teacher, were present when DPH came to test. They report that DPH planned to do wipe samples from the teachers’ and students’ desks, that are cleaned all the time. The teachers needed to insist that samples be taken in rooms near the toxic waste hills and in places that weren’t cleaned as often.
In the meantime, Housatonic River Initiative (HRI) obtained a filter or two from the school as well, and sent them to a lab in New York to be tested. This lab in New York does PCB research. This lab gave initial results from these air filters of 0.12 parts per million and 0.14 parts per million. While those numbers would be low if they were testing soil, BEAT finds them alarming for PCBs in air filters!
The DPH tests all came back as Non-Detect. But they failed to mention what tests they ran, what procedures they used, what their detection limits were, and whether they were testing for total PCBs or specific congeners.
Until BEAT sees all the results we can’t determine what these results might mean. The doctor whose lab ran the HRI tests will be in Pittsfield on December 12th, 2005. (See the next story.) Hopefully, the Department of Public Health will make its information public so we can evaluate all the results.
The Housatonic River Initiative presents
PCBs and Your Health
About 120 people attended the forum on Monday, December 12, 2005.
(attendance estimate from the Berkshire Eagle article)
What are the up to date known health effects of PCBs?
Many! According to Dr. David Carpenter. And just living with in 3 miles of a PCB site increases your risk, statistically speaking.
How do we get exposed to PCBs?
Many pathways – eating contaminated fish is one of the worst, but breathing contaminated air seems to be one of the most common.
Do PCBs volatilize into the air? YES!
How do PCBs affect children?
Probably one of the scariest sets of data shows that PCBs lower children’s IQs.
Should Hill 78 be near an elementary school?
Dr. Carpenter said that having a PCB dump 50 feet from an elementary schoolyard is “asinine”!
Lois Gibbs stressed the need for the community to take the fight into their own hands, find a new location for the school, and demand that the officials move the school – (at GE’s expense).
Dr. David Carpenter is an internationally recognized expert in PCBs and public health. He is a neurotoxicologist and professor in the Department of Environmental Health and Toxicology in the School of Public Health at State University of New York, Albany. He has worked successfully with many communities across the country to help them assess the degree of human exposure to a range of contaminants, including vast experience with PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). Dr. Carpenter has been an editorial advisor to many scientific journals, hosted a 170 station syndicated Public Health Radio Show, and former Chair of the School of Public Health at SUNY Albany. Prior to joining the University at Albany, Dr. Carpenter was a Research Physician at the Wadsworth Center for Laboratories and Research. Dr. Carpenter received his M.D. at the Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. He has 220 publications, 37 reviews and book chapters and 12 other publications to his credit.
Lois Gibbs, founder and executive director of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ), has been at the forefront of the environmental movement in the United States for over two decades. CHEJ is a grassroots environmental crisis center that has provided information, resources, technical assistance and training to more than 8,000 community groups around the nation. Currently CHEJ is conducting a “Be Safe” in schools campaign. In 1978 Gibbs, a housewife with two young children, became concerned about reports of chemical waste in her neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York. She wondered if her children’s unusual health problems and those of her neighbors were connected to their exposure to leaking chemical waste. Gibbs later discovered that her neighborhood sat on top of 21,000 tons of buried chemical waste, the now infamous Love Canal. She is the recipient of an honorary Doctorate from SUNY at Cortland, New York, the 1990 Goldman Environmental Prize, the 1998 Heinz Award, and the 1999 John Gardner Leadership Award from Independent Sector.
Co-sponsored by the Berkshire Environmental Action Team and the Housatonic Environmental Action League (CT)