Reply #2: toxic soil - Poison Politics in New Orleans [View All]

[nashville_brook]

http://www.reconstructionwatch.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=113

Poison Politics in New Orleans

by SUE STURGIS
Reconstruction Watch
April 11, 2006

NEW ORLEANS -- More than seven months after Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, Louisiana regulators remain locked in battle with environmental advocates over what to do about elevated levels of toxic chemicals in sediment left behind in the city.

On one side, groups including the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Louisiana Environmental Action Network are sounding the alarm over the results of federal Environmental Protection Agency sampling data, which they say reveals levels of heavy metals and other toxins so high that children shouldn't return to the city.

"The EPA has not lifted a finger to clean up the toxic mess that threatens the health of returning residents," says Hillary Shelton of the NAACP, member of a coalition of civil rights and religious groups calling on federal authorities to take action. "This is a scandal of major proportions."

(more at link)