Now

EPA is convinced that the public wants answers, after dozens of citizens
turned out to ask questions at

Waycross City Hall 14 November 2013.
A study of contamination sampling is in peer review,
and

GA EPD and

GA Health Dept. are also involved.
Citizens and

silentdisaster.org and

Satilla Riverkeeper and

WWALS Watershed Coalition are watching.

Matthew J. Huyser, EPA (l. standing blue shirt),

Jim Brown, GA EPD (c. standing white shirt),

Ashby Nix, Satilla Riverkeeper (facing Brown, paper in hand),

Joan Martin McNeal, silentdisaster.org (r. in group)

Roger Naylor, Public Relations Director for Southeast Health District,
is quite familiar with

Janet McMahan’s discovery of arsenic in groundwater
and says


Jane Perry of the state health department
is in charge of peer review for the contamination sampling
that
EPA’s Matthew Huyser mentioned; see below.
That’s the same Jane Perry who eventually confirmed enough evidence that

health districts across south Georgia
recommended



testing for arsenic.
See also separate post about the

Lowndes County Pecan Row landfill.

Jim Brown, Program Manager, Hazardous Waste Corrective Action Program,
Georgia Department of Natural Resource (GA DNR),
Environmental Protection Division (GA EPD),
Land Protection Branch,
mostly seemed to indicate EPA was in charge.
See also separate post about the

Lowndes County Pecan Row landfill.

Matthew J. Huyser, On-Scene Coordinator for U.S. EPA,
told me the main purpose of the meeting was to determine
whether there really was citizen demand for answers,
or was it just a handful of very vocal people.
His conclusion: yes, there were many citizens who wanted answers and action.
Plus he wanted to inform citizens that sampling has been done and
is still going on, and a study is forthcoming.
See also

separate post about EPA and the Lowndes County landfill.

Out front, keeping the attendance list, was





Sherryl A. Lane, Community Involvement Coordinator, EPA,
who was

cited in Enterprise online
as the EPA contact for that meeting.
See also separate post about the

Lowndes County Pecan Row landfill.

This meeting was requested by

Joan Martin McNeal
and the other organizers of

SilentDisaster.org
(facebook).
She was continually encouraging citizens and questioning the government
officials.


She expressed some disappointment
that there was no formal presentation and no opportunity for
the officials to answer questions where everybody could hear all at once.
EPA’s Huyser
did indicate there would be followup meetings.

This is serious business.
Many people are getting sick and dying in Waycross.
People want to know why.

Persistently questioning each government official was

Ashy Nix,
the new

Satilla Riverkeeper.
She is the contact for

Georgia Water Coalition’s Dirty Dozen 2013
about the Seven Out Superfund because it’s on that list:

Lurking within Mary Street Park, a tree-lined neighborhood park in
Waycross, is a silent killer—toxic pollutants from a defunct
industrial wastewater treatment facility known as Seven Out Tank.
Opened in 2002, the industrial waste handler operated only two years
before multiple environmental violations led to the facility’s
closure. Now, after eight years and a U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency (USEPA) supervised cleanup of the industrial site,
contamination still threatens the health of local residents,
municipal drinking water supplies and tributaries to the Satilla
River.

Also met there but not in the above meeting picture:

GA Rep. Ellis Black District 177 State representative Jason Spencer District 180
and

GA state Rep. Ellis Black (district 174).
This is where Black confirmed he was coming to the

SpectraBusters meeting against the Sabal Trail methane pipeline.

When contamination gets into a watershed,
whether from a hazardous chemical “cleanup” company
or a railroad or a pipeline,

it tends to spread into the aquifer, drinking water, wetlands, and rivers,
and maybe even into the air.
Perhaps EPA will be more thorough this time.

Joan Martin McNeal of silentdisaster.org,

Satilla Riverkeeper Ashby Nix,
and I (in my hat as a director of

WWALS Watershed Coalition)
were the last citizens to address

EPA’s Matthew J. Huyser,
reminding him: we’ll be watching.

-jsq