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Health Department, Sierra Club at odds
By Tanya Collier

Dr. Rosalie Bertell (left), of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health (IICPH) and Elizabeth May, executive director of the Sierra Club of Canada take a first hand look at the Sydney tar ponds Thursday prior to a press conference on the issues surrounding the cleanup of the more than 700,000 tons of toxic sludge.

The Sierra Club and the Department of Health butted heads Thursday after a health risk assessment report concerning Frederick Street residents came under fire.

During a news conference held in Whitney Pier Thursday, a human health risk assessment of the Frederick Street area carried out in December by Can Tox Environment – for the Department of Health and Health Canada – was cited as inadequate by Elizabeth May, executive director of the Sierra Club.

Her opinion came from a review of the assessment by the International Institute of Concern for Public Health (IICPH) – namely Roger Dixon, project partner, and Rosalie Bertell, president. “Frederick Street residents should have been evacuated long ago,” said May.

Juanita McKenzie, spokesperson for Frederick Street residents, said “we can finally say, thank God, somebody believes us. Government doesn’t have all the answers and they should be putting the concerns of residents first.”

Dr. Jeff Scott, Nova Scotia’s chief medical officer, said he, Can Tox and Health Canada reviewed the critique by IICPH and still support Can Tox’s conclusion and recommendations. Scott said the environmental firm used internationally recognized techniques and the most scientific means available. They assessed risks for a person who would be living near the coke oven site for about 70 years. “There is no risk from exposure under current conditions.”

He added the report “is very, very specific. I believe it’s a very independent, solid assessment.”

Sierra report pokes holes in toxic study
By Tera Camus / Cape Breton Bureau, Chronicle Herald, February 12, 1999
Whitney Pier - A new report says Frederick Street residents are at risk living next to the toxic coke ovens site.

Two scientists from the International Institute of Concern for Public Health in Oakville, Ont., disagree with the government-funded Cantox Environmental study that is the basis for the province's refusal to move the Frederick Street residents.

The scientists - Rosalie Bertell and Roger Dixon - say the Cantox study is flawed and makes too many assumptions to declare residents safe from migrating toxins.

"People on Frederick Street are living with levels of contamination that make it unfit for commercial use, much less residential use," said Elizabeth May of the Sierra Club, the group that commissioned the scientists' report. "Look at who's the polluter, who's the regulator, who's the judge and jury, who's responsible, who's liable ... it all goes back to the provincial and federal governments ... so they don't want to say the extent of the risk, and the extent of the health hazard that's happening here, because to admit that, they then are concerned about liability issues."

But Public Works Minister Cliff Huskilson, whose department is the lead partner trying to clean up Sydney's toxic sites, says that's not true.

"We are concerned about the residents that live in the area and we want what's best for them." But he said the province will not move the residents, despite the questions posed in this latest report.

"We want to do the right thing, and we don't want to make mistakes."

Ms. Bertell and Mr. Dixon poked holes in the Cantox study, funded by the federal and provincial governments and conducted over three weeks last summer for $50,000.

The scientists say the study's problems include: Too many uncertainties about the mixture of toxins and how they interact; Inadequate site characterization in terms of the toxins and how they travel by soil and water; Failure to define "health risk" or "immediate health risk"; Failure to take in the human factor such as danger to pregnant women and their fetuses, or the elderly; and Data are dependent upon unconfirmed third-party sampling data, such as a garden study in other parts of Sydney.

"We believe the report is scientifically flawed and that you've been given information affecting your health, both physiological and psychological, which cannot be substantiated by the information used in the Cantox report," Mr. Dixon said to a small group of residents who gathered for the news conference near Frederick Street.

Mr. Dixon and Ms. Bertell say the area is the worst they've seen. "You have a massive amount of pollutants here, a very diverse one," Ms. Bertell said. "It ought to be declared an international site for remediation and health and safety practices."

Cantox Environmental rejects the report criticizing its study. "We followed internationally accepted methods designed to assess contaminated sites," Christine Moore said. She said Cantox was asked to conduct a study using existing data, and it believes there was a sufficient amount of such data to determine the potential health risk.

Dr. Jeff Scott, the provincial chief medical officer, says Ms. Bertell's and Mr. Dixon's findings haven't changed his mind about residents' safety.

"Cantox was a very important, credible company that did a good, comprehensive assessment," Dr. Scott said from Halifax. "That's why I engaged them, and I'm very comfortable with that." He also defended the science, noting that Cantox used very conservative estimates.

Sydney-Victoria MP Peter Mancini has called on federal Health Minister Allan Rock to act. "The new report seriously undermines the decision not to move the residents of Frederick Street and adds urgency to their call for action," Mr. Mancini said.

Frederick Street resident Juanita McKenzie became teary when she heard the report. "Government-paid studies came back and said we were in no danger. Well, today has been a long time coming for us. "We can finally say, 'Thank God, someone believes us, we've been vindicated.' The government has to acknowledge that they don't have all the answers, and maybe they should put the health of residents first."

But activist Bruno Marcocchio said that likely will not happen. "What we have here is the total disempowerment of a community primarily for short-term political reasons," he said. The media and local politicians are to blame, he said. "We're a politically unimportant part of a politically unimportant part of the country," he said.

PUBLICATION: National Post
DATE: Fri 12 Feb 1999
EDITION: National
SECTION/CATEGORY: News
PAGE NUMBER : A8
BYLINE Environment Canada report
STORY LENGTH: 296
Sydney tar pond neighbours may be evacuated, study says
Residents of the neighbourhood adjoining the Sydney tar ponds in Cape Breton may need to be evacuated before authorities can clean up 750,000 tonnes of toxic sludge, a study commissioned by Environment Canada suggests.

But the study, released Tuesday night, does not map out the area which will need to be evacuated, and has left some residents of the small Nova Scotia town, which is the site of Canada's worst toxic-waste dump, angry the long-awaited report failed to provide details about the evacuation.

``It's going to take further scientific study,'' said Germain Lemoine, a spokeswoman for the Joint Action Group which has been created by the federal and provincial governments to work with community groups on the cleanup.

Ms. Lemoine said a ``buffer zone'' will need to be created to ensure that no homes are contaminated during the cleanup.

Bruno Marcocchio, a former JAG member who left because he felt it was stalling, yesterday attacked the report, which was put together by outside consultants who studied the site, for failing to detail exactly which areas will need to be evacuated. Defining the area will now be left up to JAG, which does not have the scientific credentials to determine how broad an area stands to be affected.

``They expect a group of community volunteers to make what must ultimately be some sort of a scientific decision,'' said Mr. Marcocchio, an outspoken environmentalist whose wife died at 38 of cervical cancer after spending much of her life near the tar ponds.

A Health Canada report released last summer found no link between the area's ecological problems and its elevated rate of cancer. But that finding was criticized yesterday by the Sierra Club, which commissioned a study of its own. That study concluded the government data was incomplete.

National Post

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