Indiana Harbor and Canal Project

Community Questions and Concerns

The Technical Outreach Services for Communities (TOSC) Program and the Grand Calumet Task Force (GCTF) have gathered information on citizen questions and concerns through attendance at meetings, discussions with community members, meeting notes from other agencies, and newspapers accounts.  We heard concerns firsthand when TOSC staffers Kirk Riley and Saradhi Balla attended the Environmental Justice Workshop, sponsored by The Northwest Indiana Environmental Justice Partnership, on April 20, 2002, in Gary.  Kirk Riley, and Angelina Mendoza, GCTF Executive Director, also attended the Open House held by the U.S. ACE and U.S. EPA on December 4^th at the Riley Social Center, in East Chicago.   During these meetings and discussions, citizens expressed concerns about the safety of the confined disposal facility, human health risks associated with the dredging (particularly exposures to contaminants through air emissions), the suitability of mechanical dredging, along with other concerns.    The following listing provides additional details on community questions and concerns, and provides a basis for developing educational and technical assistance services that TOSC may provide.  The basis for the concerns has not been evaluated scientifically by TOSC, and TOSC may not address all of the questions listed below.

Human health:

• Is this project hazardous to human health? What is the geographic area where human health hazards may occur from this project? What standard will be used in determining risk? Will it include dangers to children, along with dangers to adults?
• Who is responsible to provide compensation to the people whose health is harmed by the project?
• Can US EPA and the Corps determine and provide the results of the cumulative health risks resulting from the health risks of various individual toxins?
• Has Professor Louis Thibodeaux's work been taken into account in the supplemental risk assessment work being completed by the US EPA?
• Can the project be delayed until all the information, such as the supplemental risk assessment, has been produced?
• What can the community expect in air emissions once the project begins? Will the level of contaminant emissions from the project site be higher than the current level of air emissions?
• Can dredging during colder weather reduce air emissions? Can dredging be suspended when temperatures are high? Can the Confined Disposal Facility (CDF) be covered in order to reduce the amount of air emissions that go into the atmosphere as the sediment dries?
• The CDF will be open for thirty years while dredging takes place. Citizens may be exposed to a mixture of toxic chemicals.  No one knows the effects of long-term exposure to unknown mixtures of these chemicals, and no one knows what the effects will be on their children. 
• EPA’s risk assessments were done on 25-year old adults. Toxins are more harmful to children than to adults.
• During the dredging, sediments will be exposed to the air, heat, and water, causing them to volatilize. This means that toxic chemicals will escape from the mud where they now lie, and be blown about on the wind. 
• The sediments would be loaded onto barges and brought to the confined disposal facility using mechanical dredging. Residents are against this because they fear more sediment would become airborne. They instead want hydraulic dredging done by using a method that sucks up the sediment and pipes it to the confined disposal facility.

The Confined Disposal Facility and its location:

• What is the basis for selecting the ECI site? The selection process did not include residents.
• Why won’t the entities in charge of the project listen to the members of the public with regard to the site? What can the residents who are opposed to the project do to stop the siting of the CDF at the former ECI site?
• Concerns were expressed for the people who live, work or go to school close to the site. Central High School and West Side Middle School are only 800 yards from the CDF site.
• The confined disposal facility might leak.
• Even after dredging is finished and the CDF is finally closed, the danger will not go away.  CDF walls and caps are known to crack or collapse as they deteriorate with age and stress.
• What will be the impact of the CDF on community property values? The government should set up funds that would compensate property owners for significant losses.
• In the report on CDF emissions, how did Dr. Thibodeaux arrive at the expected degree of rain? It was not adequately explained in his report. Residents feel the rainfall amount was underestimated.
• Isn't there land available at the ISG site (former LTV site) where the CDF could be constructed?
• What are the results of Eddy pump demonstration, and when will they be available to the public?

Community Involvement

• Have the agencies working on the project really listened to the community concerns?
• Why is it going to take so long for the project to get completed?
• How can the project plan be portrayed as providing environmental justice to the community when it will increase pollution for thirty years?

Air Monitoring

• What is the purpose of the air monitoring stations? When will results be available?
• Why are acceptable air emissions levels not listed on the Corps web page? Why are the air samples being taken only once every 6 days? Doesn't this mean that the community can be unknowingly exposed to air toxins during the other 5 days?
• Given that the air quality in East Chicago already represents a significant health risk to the community, how can the regulatory agencies allow the Corps and the East Chicago Waterway Management District to construct the CDF at a site where it will act as an additional source of air contamination to the citizens?

 Geology of the site:

• Are there any caverns located at the CDF site?
• Has there been a geological study of the site?

Non-Federal Sponsor:

• What is the status of the East Chicago Waterway Management District (ECWMD)?
• When does the ECWMD Board meet?