An Advocate for Nature's Balance

1947 brochure, US Dept. of Agriculture

By Daniel Mercurio


Silent Spring’s author Rachel Carson once stated, “In nature nothing exists alone.” This statement is important because it relates to the checks and balances system applied by the natural environment, which serves to keep the populations of different species in check through the use of both biotic and abiotic factors. However, mankind has altered this delicate balance by inventing insecticides that are used to control populations of insects that humans consider pests. 

As insects developed immunity to the insecticides, their populations exploded, posing more than a nuisance to people. It has also led certain insects to develop harmful adaptations and become immune to the chemicals found within these sprays. If people continue to associate the fact that humans are the dominant species with the notion that their all-powerful actions have no consequences, then there will be more negative environmental impacts as the natural system of checks and balances will break down.

I believe humans need to realize that there are limitations to their actions and that all species have a right to survive since the creator of the earth intended for all the inhabitants of the planet to live in balance and to appropriately use the resources that our planet provides.

Clearly, many people need to change their attitudes and actions if they are to satisfy nature’s system of checks and balances. In order to promote the shift, people must be educated about the consequences concerning the use of insecticides. There must also be enforcement through the implementation of environmental regulations that prohibit the use of these chemical agents. This would create an environmental movement as more and more people would feel compelled to invest in more environmentally friendly alternatives.  

Moreover, the shift would be complemented by the fact that scientists have already begun to develop alternatives to the harmful insecticides currently being used. In fact, an excerpt from Silent Spring highlights some of the progress scientists have made toward finding solutions. 

“A truly extraordinary variety of alternatives to the chemical control of insects is available,” Rachel Carson wrote. “Some are already in use and have achieved brilliant success. Others are in the stage of laboratory testing. Still others are little more than ideas in the minds of imaginative scientists waiting for the opportunity to put them to the test. All have this in common: they are biological solutions, based on an understanding of the living organisms they seek to control, and of the whole fabric of life to which these organisms belong. Specialists representing various areas of the vast field of biology are contributing – entomologists, pathologists, geneticists, physiologists, biochemists, ecologists – all pouring their knowledge and their creative inspirations into the formation of a new science of biotic controls.”

Clean Water and Human Rights

By Melanie Schuck


The panel on the water crisis in Flint, Michigan at Ramapo College on February 25 was an excellent event to attend. The five panelists each spoke on a different topic connected to the main panel theme. The consensus of the panel was that the government had failed in the situation in Flint. Connected to this consensus is why the government failed in protecting and informing its citizens. Michigan Governor Snyder’s philosophy of government was to cut costs in any way possible. Therefore, his government created the situation and did little to resolve it. In fact, the government of Michigan ignored complaints from residents and overrode decisions to assist the situation.              

An interesting note that I made at the panel was that water is not by law considered a basic human right. The basic human rights, by law, are food, shelter and clothing. The reason this occurred was because water is such a fundamental right it was left out of the legal definition of a human right. Because of this, water was made private in many places in the 1970’s and 1980’s. We see the result of this in the private companies that supply our homes with water and the companies such as Poland Spring and Nestle that sell bottled water. On the topic of bottled water, that has been proposed as a possible solution to the tainted water in Flint. However, as pointed out at the panel discussion, bottled water would be a temporary solution to a major problem.          

The situation in Flint is an example of environmental turbulence. Environmental turbulence can be natural or human caused. In this case, the turbulence is caused by humans but there were instances of natural causes in the situation. The main problem with Flint is that the pipes that are carrying the water into homes are made of lead or have lead in them. However, there were issues with the water that was being brought through the pipes when the original water source was switched to the contaminated Flint River. The second water source had certain elements in it that corroded lead in the pipes and caused the water to be even more unsafe than the original water source which provided a substance that coated the lead.
                
It seems to me that the environmental crisis in Flint, Michigan is a case of the government failing to do its job, which is something that many governments have done.

EPA Meeting in Ringwood: A Lesson in American History

By Melanie Schuck
 

I was asked to go to the town hall meeting in Ringwood, New Jersey by Dr. Stead for my Global Ethics class. By the time the meeting began, the room was so packed full of people that our entire class had to stand on the outskirts of the room in order to allow for everyone to come into the space. Even then it was not enough room so Dr. Stead designated three students, including myself, to stay and observe the meeting while the rest of the class went to a back room in the borough hall for the rest of the meeting.  

The meeting started off calm enough but as the Environmental Protection Agency officials gave their presentation regarding the status of the paint sludge that had been dumped there by Ford Motor Company when the plant in Mahwah was still functioning, it became quite clear that there was a disconnect between the EPA and the residents of Ringwood. Every once in a while a resident would interrupt to ask a question or to ask for clarification on something the EPA presenter had said. This led to constant interruption and questions, but to me it seemed to be well deserved due to the disconnect that was present.
               
There was one particular part of the meeting that stuck with me, that I do not even have to refer to my notes to remember. After numerous questions on the part of the residents, one of the members of the Citizens Advisory Group who was obviously frustrated said something akin to “we’ll never get through this presentation unless we do this as civilized people.” I physically recoiled at this as the residents began to protest against the use of the word “civilized.” The CAG member tried to backpedal as she said “I didn’t mean that you’re not civilized.” But, it was too late. She had said it and the residents had most definitely heard her say it. One resident who was standing near me was muttering under his breath about the word civilized.  

The first thing that popped into my head was the racist implications of implying that the residents of the affected Ringwood neighborhood were not civilized. That implication stretches all the way back to the days of the settlement of the Americas since the vast majority of the residents of the iron mining area of Ringwood are part of the Ramapough Lenape Turtle Clan. Clearly, there are some serious racist implications of implying that the Native Americans that live in Ringwood are uncivilized, because in the days when settlers were landing in the New World, they believed the Natives living there to be ‘savages’ and ‘uncivilized.’ Dr. Stead had warned us that we would witness environmental racism first-hand, but I did not know what to expect. I definitely did not count on being so uncomfortable witnessing what took place in that meeting.
               
It took at least an hour and a half to two hours to get through the entirety of the presentation that the EPA was giving the residents about the latest hazardous chemical found in groundwater and streams in the area. The meeting began at seven in the evening and lasted well over three hours. I left at ten o’clock because it had stretched past my class time and the inefficiency of the meeting was taking its toll on me. Despite the fact that I felt that the meeting was completely inefficient and that there were constant interruptions on the part of the Ringwood residents, I have to side with them over the EPA. They have every right to be angry with the EPA. The EPA was spitting out numbers at them rather them giving them an actual solution to help them. As Chief Perry pointed out, he asks the same question at every meeting regarding the health and welfare of his people and what the EPA plans on doing to help them. He received no answer.

Toxic Legacy Continues

Paint sludge clean up in Torne Valley     (photo: Jan Barry)

By Larissa Ledo


Decades after burying toxic paint sludge along the Ramapo River at Torne Valley, Ford finally came forward with a clean up. Overseen by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, the clean up work now underway is expected to get rid of the toxic paint sludge along Torne Brook off Torne Valley Road across from the former Ramapo landfill.

Ford representatives said that they did not know about the lead paint being there, however the way the paint was buried underground, it’s clear the paint was purposely put there in a way that Ford contractors hoped no one would ever find it. The fight to get the lead out of there was not easy. After many years, in 2005 Ford began to remove more than 50,000 tons of contaminated soil from another dump site in Ringwood, NJ. In 2013, Ford contractors removed about 30,000 tons of paint sludge and tainted soil from a wellfield along the Ramapo River next to Torne Valley.

Lead is a very dangerous toxicant that affects multiple body systems and is particularly harmful to young children, due to the sweet taste it has so children usually eat it. Lead exposure contributes to children developing intellectual disabilities. It is distributed to the brain, liver kidney, and bones.

In the Torne Valley case most people were not touching lead, however it was affecting the area’s water supply, which brings water to a large part of Rockland County. Lead also is in the water because of lead in water pipes, which has led to people drinking lead without knowing. Many people before using the water let it run for at least a minute or so for precaution.

In Ringwood, the Ramapoughs, a Native American tribe, have said that because of Ford’s pollution there were many premature deaths in their community. It is very sad to learn that something so toxic that can endanger the lives of so many people was around for so long. The pictures shown in The Record’s “Toxic Legacy” report of people’s skin from touching the lead paint without knowing are heartbreaking. It is even more sad to know that kids were mentally affected by it, affecting their capacity to learn.

Multiple Threats along the Ramapo River

Ramapo River in Mahwah     (photo: Jan Barry)

By Larissa Ledo


The Ramapo River is approximately 30 miles long in southern New York and northern New Jersey part of the Passaic River Basin. It provides water for over 200,000 residents and is a popular place for fly fishing, but also known to be the most populated river in northern New Jersey.

The river was contaminated a few decades ago when Ford Motor Company produced six million cars and trucks at a plant in Mahwah. The pollution, lead paint sludge, was dumped in Mahwah and other places upstream in Hillburn, NY, threatening the region’s water supply. Those who rely on the river as a source for drinking water are exposed to the risk of drinking contaminated water. 

Paint sludge contamination in an area of Hillburn along the Ramapo River and a tributary, Torne Brook, was discovered by a Ramapo College professor, Chuck Stead, on a hike with his students. At first the company denied knowing about the contamination, but later on if was discovered that the lead paint sludge was purposely buried in the area and found its way into the river. When the paint get hard it breaks into small pieces which makes it easier for it to migrate into the river. The contamination put the area’s most important watershed at risk. 

In 2005 when The Record reveled the paint was still in the area and at another dump site in Ringwood, NJ, Ford removed more than 50,000 tons of contaminated soil in Ringwood. That site is near the Wanaque Reservoir, which supplies water to millions of people in New Jersey.  

Another threat to the Ramapo River is that when Hurricane Irene passed through an oil spill happened which became a concern for Mahwah’s residents since they get their drinking water from wells along the river. The storm water flooded several oil trucks and fuel storage tanks. The flood was also what revealed the paint sludge in the Ramapo River that was found by Professor Stead’s students. 

The Ramapo River is known for frequent flooding problems. To address this problem, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection came up with a project to reduce the flood damage. The project provides a 40-year level of flood protection. It consisted of installing two floodgates at Pompton Lake Dam, as well as widening and deepening approximately one-mile of the Ramapo River upstream of Pompton Lake. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, in partnership with the Department od Environmental Protection, permitted and managed the construction of the project.

New Agent Orange Cleanup Plan for Passaic River

Sign Posted Along Passaic River by NJDEP

By Marissa Erdelyi


The federal government released a $1.38 billion plan on March 4 to clean a highly contaminated portion of the Passaic River.

In 1962, the U.S. military launched Operation Ranch Hand during the Vietnam War. The operation lasted almost 10 years and resulted in spraying an estimated 20 million gallons of herbicides, prominently Agent Orange, to kill jungle foliage. While this event ended nearly 45 years ago, the life of Agent Orange has yet to meet its end.

The Passaic River, located in northern New Jersey, has fallen victim to the fallout of Agent Orange. It’s advised not to eat the fish in the river, due to the high chemical levels found in the water. Eating fish or crabs from the Lower Passaic may cause cancer, liver damage, birth defects, and reproductive issues, according to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.

Chemicals were dumped into the water back in the day, when more than 100 factories were arranged along the banks of the river. One of these factories was Diamond Alkali. This factory was located in Newark and produced Agent Orange.

The river’s sediment is contaminated with contaminants including, but not limited to, pesticides, dioxin, and polychlorinated biphenyl.

The Environmental Protection Agency originally proposed a cleanup plan in April 2014. This original plan was $1.7 billion and called for liable companies to pay for the cleaning of the entire riverbed along the Lower Passaic River.

According to ABC News, the latest plan involves the cleaning of the lower eight miles of the river by removing 3.5 million cubic yards of toxic sediment. The bottom portion of the river contains 90 percent of the contamination. Following the removal of toxic sediment, the stretch of river bottom would be capped, keeping much of the contamination from getting into the rest of the river and the Newark Bay.

The contaminated sediment would be moved to out of state facilities. Material containing dioxin, a contaminant in Agent Orange which causes long-term health impacts, would be destroyed or buried in a hazardous-waste landfill.

While the new cleanup plan is drastically cheaper than the original proposed in 2014, it is still one of the most expensive Superfund site cleanups in history.

“The EPA’s cleanup plan will improve water quality, protect public health, revitalize waterfront areas and create hundreds of new jobs,” said EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck.

Agent Orange Health Assistance Still a Problem for Many Veterans

VA poster for veterans assistance

By Daniel Mercurio


Not all wartime veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange are qualified to earn disability compensation. This has sparked a tremendous amount of controversy between the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and countless numbers of ailing veterans, particularly those who served during the Vietnam War.

Although Congress passed the Agent Orange Act in 1991, it still failed to help the majority of veterans who may qualify for health benefits. According to an investigation in 2015 by ProPublica and the Virginian-Pilot, titled "Agent Orange Act was supposed to Help Vietnam Veterans – But Many Still Don’t Qualify," the act states, “Certain diseases tied to chemical exposure would be presumed to be related to a vet’s military service and would make the vet eligible for benefits. The list has grown over time and now includes various cancers, diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, peripheral neuropathy and heart disease, among others. However, to get these benefits, veterans must have actually set foot on Vietnamese soil or served on a craft in its rivers.”

About 2.6 men and women served in the US military in what was called the Vietnam Theater, yet only 650,000 veterans with illnesses related to Agent Orange exposure have received assistance from the VA, according to the article. Among the veterans whose claims have been rejected are Navy veterans who served offshore and veterans who served at US air bases in Thailand.

To complicate matters, the Department of Veterans Affairs has not been open to expanding its coverage of benefits to veterans exposed to Agent Orange who did not set foot on Vietnamese soils. It took four years for United States Senators Richard Burr and Jeff Merkley to push the VA to provide benefits for Air Force personnel who served stateside but came in contact with Agent Orange while aboard C-123 aircraft used to spray the substance. In fact, this expansion of benefits to the Air Force and Air Force reserve occurred months after the National Institute of Medicine published a report stating that there was a non-trivial increase in a veteran’s risk of experiencing negative health outcomes.

This led Senator Burr to say, "The effort of these veterans to secure overdue VA care and benefits for harmful exposure to Agent Orange has not been one of the agency's finest hours. This frustrating, four year process has laid bare the lengths that the VA will go to disregard science and the facts of the historical record. I am pleased that VA Secretary McDonald has chosen to finally do the right thing for these ailing veterans, but it shouldn't have been this hard or taken so long."

The VA has also made it difficult for Blue Water Veterans who may have been exposed to drinking water contaminated with Agent Orange while aboard ships stationed just off the Vietnamese coast to receive benefits. In fact, an excerpt from the Virginian-Pilot and ProPublica article states, “In 2002, a VA report found there was insufficient evidence to connect health problems of blue water sailors with chemical exposure aboard ships, establishing the basis for denying benefits to vets who didn't set foot in Vietnam. That decision was upheld by a federal appeals court in 2008. However, a 2011 report by the National Institute of Medicine identified several "plausible routes" for Agent Orange exposure through the water distillation process aboard Navy ships, as well as through the air.” This caused the U.S. Veterans Court of Appeals to rule in favor of the veterans.

Aside from those who fought in Vietnam, veterans stationed at bases in Thailand from April 1968-August 1971 are still struggling to secure benefits from the VA. In fact, many of these veterans may have been exposed to Agent Orange that was sprayed around military establishments. These veterans are having a difficult time trying to obtain the required documentation that proves that they were sent to work in areas where the toxic substance was sprayed.

For more information:
www.propublica.org/article/agent-orange-act-was-supposed-to-help-vietnam-veterans-but-many-still-dont-