Gowanus Superfund: City And Elected Officials Spinning As Fast As They Can

Last Night's C.G.N.A. meeting at the Hannah Senesh School

Maria Pagano, C.G.N.A. President

Caswell Holloway, Chief of Staff for Deputy Mayor Schyler

Joshua Verleun, Staff Attorney and Investigator for Riverkeeper, Inc.

Lauren Collins, Acting Director of the Gowanus Canal Conservancy

Buddy Scotto

David Von Spreckelsen ( Foreground) Toll Brothers' V.P.

who is lobbying the city to reject the Superfund.

Gowanus Superfund: City Official Taking Questions

Jim Vogel, Spokesperson for State Senator Velmanette Montgomery

Thank goodness the EPA will either designate the Gowanus Canal as a Superfund site or not purely based on science, because if the agency could be influenced by our elected officials, we would all literally be up shit creek.

For the last two weeks, our electeds have been 'spinning' and closing ranks as fast as they can in regards to the Gowanus Canal Superfund nomination. Mayor Bloomberg had been the first to announce that he is against the nomination. Councilman Bill DeBlasio was right behind him. Others, such as Assemblywoman Joan Millman, have been sitting on the fence ever since. Most surprisingly, State Senator Daniel Squadron, who had shown such promise as a forward thinking politician, willing to engage and to listen to his constituents, failed to show any leadership in this matter. What a great disappointment.
The sole politician who came out in favor of Superfund has been State Senator Velmanette Montgomery. Her willingness to follow her conscience is admirable.

Speaking as one, those less courageous politicians have been advertising an alternative plan to EPA's Superfund designation for the Gowanus Canal. What exactly this alternative plan entailed was not revealed to the community until last night, when Caswell Holloway, Chief of Staff for Deputy Mayor Schyler finally 'enlightened' the community at the Carroll Gardens Neighborhood Association meeting on Monday evening.

So what is this plan? Simply speaking, it entails a "faster, more efficient clean-up" which is up to EPA's standard, without the stigma associated with the Superfund name. The only difference I could detect between the city's proposal and the EPA's
Superfund program seemed to be the way responsible polluters would be brought to task for the clean-up. The city's plan would ask the polluters to come to the table 'voluntarily,' Mr. Holloway stated. The other difference, of course, is in the name Superfund.

It was clear from many of the questions asked by the audience, that there is much scepticism that the city can get the canal cleaned as thoroughly as the EPA.
Someone in the audience wanted to know why the city was mirroring the efforts of the EPA instead of letting the agency handle the clean-up. Another wanted to know why the city had neglected the canal for so many decades, just to be playing catch-up to the EPA now. Yet another asked Mr. Holloway if the city would still go forward with a clean-up even if the Gowanus area's rezoning from industrial to residential may not.

One thing became incredibly clear to me while I listened to Mr. Holloway. Before the EPA stepped forward with their Superfund proposal for the canal, the city was going to do the very least it could do to clean the polluted waterway before allowing residential housing to be built on its shore. And that seemed to be all right with our elected officials.
Shame on them. They collectively failed to represent this community.
Lets all remember that when they want to get re-elected.

They owe the residents of Carroll Gardens and Greater Gowanus an apology.


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