SD City Beat Greenhouse Soil Blamed by Neighbors for Illness
What they didn’t foresee was the danger of building on land steeped in pesticides. It was widely known that the soil contained high levels of dieldrin, an insecticide. City Ventures proposed to bury the contaminated earth. The city of Encinitas conducted an environmental study and determined that, with City Ventures’ remediation plan, the project “will not adversely affect the health, safety or general welfare of the community.”
However, during the last two weeks, as many as 16 people in the neighborhood have come down ill, complaining of a variety of symptoms that are consistent with exposure to dieldrin.
“Dizziness and disorientation, sore throat, blisters and rashes, vomiting, severe headaches and nausea,” says Frank Delahoyde, an analyst at Scripps Institute of Oceanography, whose home backs up to the project, in an emailed statement. “And it is the ones that stay at home that have become the sickest. I’m gone for most of the day, but have experienced unusual coughing in the mornings before I leave for work.”
He adds that one of his dogs stopped eating and began experiencing seizures. His family—and his dog—have temporarily moved to alternative housing, along with several other residents. Maria Lindsay, another resident, tells CityBeat she has moved to a hotel after testing positive for dieldrin in her body.
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The City claims it does not have any role, or decision making power, regarding public health issues. They job it out to County Public Health. The last time this came up, Council and planning were very clear on this. In fact, they brought in a woman from County Public Health to a Council meeting. In a phone conversation with this particular woman, a few days later, I challenged her statistical data. She, in turn, offered me a job, as their statistician had just retired. Moral of the story- don't expect much help now.
ReplyDeleteThe city does have a role in public health and safety. I watched the last meeting where public health issues came up and there wasn't a lady from the County at the meeting.
ReplyDeleteI find it extremely interesting that not one single paper covered this story.
ReplyDeleteThe same situation exists on the Hall property.
ReplyDeleteThe city recently chose to not address the issue of removing 5000 truck loads of toxic soil if and when the I-5
expansion happens. They just shelved all the improvements that were proposed so they would not have to address the obvious health concerns.
Now, according to the EIR, kids can play there but it is not fit to build homes.
Starman-Perhaps things have changed. How about asking the City Manager if the City is in charge of our own public health issues. If it is, I want to complain about a few things. I was told the City was not the place to complain. Maybe I was lied to?
ReplyDeleteI drink too much beer. When I wake up the next morning and my soil irritates my arse.
ReplyDeleteHH,
ReplyDeleteYou're in luck. The Council Christian Temperance Union is closing down the sports bars on 101.
Copy of email sent to me:
ReplyDeleteThis is not good news for those of us living near the Hall property, and even further away when the wind is blowing. Can the city be trusted with County supervision to safely grade the property and bury the contaminated soil? The Hall property has Toxaphene contamination. This is a more serious carcinogen than Dieldrin. Past City behavior has been very deceptive. It took a lawsuit to have the city do an EIR, which documented the contamination. With the present budget crunch the City will be looking to cut corners and save costs in any way possible. I don't have a lot of confidence that the City will do the cleanup correctly.
Doesn't the City issue the permits to build -- so if the site is unsafe why would the City approve a building permit? The City certainly can enforce toxic clean-up by not issuing permits until the sites are free from contamination -- what is so hard about that?
ReplyDeleteThe situation on Hymettus shows the inadequacy of the County supervised remediation. The frequently vilified group in Cardiff tried to get the supervision of the Hall property transferred to Sacramento, where the staff is more experienced. But the City maneuvered with the County to get this squashed. There doesn't seem to be any interest at the local level to insure the safety of the public.
ReplyDeleteThe City can take charge of its own health safety issues, the only restriction is the need to follow state and county rules and regulations. Our City likes to fob off its responsibility to the County. It's a way to ignore and distance itself from the problem. With cuts in staff and budget at the County it works better than ever for the city, but to the detriment of us citizens.