This week on, you said newsmakers taking on the Fifth Ward cancer,
cluster, four years. It’s been the source of concern
about the health of residents impacted by the presence of chemicals. In the soil,
a
summit this past week was designed to
gather information and call for specific action.
Houston city council member dr. Leticia Palmer’s, here
to talk about it.
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From KPRC to this
is Houston newsmakers with khambrel Marshall.
Well, for years, the residents, in the Kashmir,
Gardens area. The Fifth. Ward knew something was wrong.
People in the community were dying early cancer. And other ailments
were taking lives too soon. The suspicion that
it had something to do with the nearby Union Pacific, Rail Yards. Well,
those suspicions were verified after several carcinogenic chemicals
were found in the soil. And now for years,
the effort has been to find
Way to make things, right, but how
dr. Leticia plumber is the at-large Houston
city council member for position for and this past week, let us Summit
to try to get some of those answers to provide Solutions. Christine Omen,
is he Consulting hydrogeologist, whose expertise is
the impact on ground water and soils, because of oil waste and
more. Good morning to both of you. Good morning. Good morning. This is really something
very different. You wanted something Beyond a news conference to try to get
something established.
What has been to take away from what you’ve been able to do over this past week?
Week. So it was really important to for three things to happen. One. The
world need to be reminded of what was happening in Fifth Ward.
So
they’re not forgotten.
Number two, it was important for our
our partners
to come in front of people and let them know what is going on from expert
perspective. So bringing the export stakeholders
and then the most important part was making sure we heard the people.
And so this was a three-day Summit that
that was a combination of panel discussions, a town hall
and that are really effective Roundtable conversation
to where people could really sit down.
Down with the experts and have and ask the questions that they’ve been wanting to hear
and was almond Wednesday. It was one of the experts. Yes. I want to ask you specifically.
We see the headlines. We see the occasional and news conferences about
what’s going on there. How bad is it for those living there?
And what options do they have?
Well, when you say how bad,
the significant contamination is with creosote
and
what creosote does because it’s heavier than
water
it seeps into the ground.
Sometimes moves, horizontally
drops down
a huge plume of creosote
went underneath the residential homes.
And what the contamination exposure route
is and was
where toxic Vapors evaporating off that
plume
coming up to the land surface.
Those are the chemical contaminants
that have impacted. The neighborhood is remediation
and option, in that sort of thing, it didn’t sound like it is
Sounds like you have to take out everything. Well it’s you can’t dig
it up.
What you can do is put in Vapor extraction
systems
that you can put in under a home or if building
a new home
you can build and
Vapor extraction system underneath the foundation.
So
that any Vapors that would have otherwise gone
into your bedroom. For example,
would be expelled to the atmosphere in a safe
manner.
I’m guessing that
Well in the community. They hear that kind of. They probably been hearing that for a while.
Yeah but there’s probably a lot of concern about. Why
am I going to continue to live here?
What kind of feedback did you get from the community members? So honestly, they want
to live there. So as you know, khambrel I mean Fifth. Ward was the first
place that anyone of color could even live. It is where we have Legacy
in our homes have been built and really high school is there.
I mean it’s so much deep history that’s there. And so really a lot
of the residents want to stay
many of the many of the stakeholders are saying
that my moving
Relocation is something that should be on the table
and obviously we want people to do what they want to do
but you know as for some said there’s an opportunity to clean
up that site in a good enough way
to where people can stay there safely.
The creosote is the main problem but the other issues we see are
the other environmental injustices that happen. And this is a lot with tcq.
Senator miles is working on this. You know,
he just put a Senate Bill 178.
I’m in place
because we are putting a multiple issues there.
Metal metal.
Factories cement batch. Plant is its culmination,
right?
The crease is the main problem that we’re seeing and it’s been there
for decades.
So,
do you think that people have
in that Community? They’ve been feeling like their concerns have been addressed
or they feeling frustrated, they’re frustrated, they’re tired of the meetings, they’re
tired of continuing to hear people coming to their areas.
They
want they want not only do they want to be made whole
right now,
but they want historical
restoration, right?
Because they’ve lost family members and grandmas and grandpas and aunties and
uncles that have logged been lost to cancer. So my question for you
is is it inevitable if people live in that environment
that they will ultimately get sick based upon what you know about those
chemicals there?
Well I can’t really respond to that. Other than
to say that
the nature of creosote
is that with time
and after all the vapors, the toxic Vapors
evaporate, the creosote changes into
a consistency
Similar to peanut butter.
So that creosote, it’s down there.
However,
we found records that showed that Union, Pacific
allowed other
chemical companies
to send them their
contaminated, hazardous waste and Union
Pacific burned it on site
which released
toxic chemicals, including dioxin
in a Fallout pattern,
Wow.
So
that’s going on. By the way we’re going to do newsmakers extra. We got to talk more about
what
we have time to do here, though.
What’s the answers
coming away from that was the answer right now, for what’s going
to be next steps for you.
So the good news is that all of the
governmental bodies are all in lockstep.
So the EPA is overseeing
and want to make sure I’m very clear on that. They are not doing the testing
up’ will be doing the testing,
but the EPA would be
Seeing all of the results
are goal or their goal
is to end all of and to come up with something by December 20 23.
So the end of the year pretty much
and then we’ll see what those numbers look like and then we’ll take steps
their
butts. So the people there know that you have a plan and you have dates
that you want to try to hit absolutely UPS. Do.
I mean?
Sorry, Union
the EPA. Yes, are the EPA
is doing a really good job of doing community efforts. We’ve got
lots of Community Partners, like impact.
The Bullard school at ESU.
Su they’re really kind of going out and making sure that people know what’s going
on and what they need to
and you know what’s available for them,
we’re going to continue this conversation. That is more because coming out of this,
you kind of open my eyes and I’m scared for the people living there, we want to
get some of these answers and who’s going to pay
for some of the things that need to get done. Yeah,
dr. Plumber, Christine I want thank you
so much for being here.