East Side residents enraged by manganese pollution tear into city and federal officials

More than 100 people gathered at a southeast-side community center Thursday evening to hear city and federal officials talk about manganese pollution recently discovered near an industrial storage facility owned by the S.H. Bell Company. The city's Department of Public Health presented data from soil sampling conduced at 27 addresses; some samples revealed concentrations of the neurotoxic heavy metal that exceeds thresholds for emergency removal. Representatives from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the CDC were also present to outline next steps in analyzing the soil at homes near S.H. Bell. Though the meeting was meant to educate residents about what's currently known about manganese contamination in the area, the officials were quickly schooled by organized and vocal East Siders, who had little patience for bureaucratic lingo and ambiguous explanations.

Tenth Ward alderman Sue Sadlowski Garza set the tone in her opening remarks before the panel: "I'm a proud resident, and I'm also proud of how hardworking the people are here, and how much this community sticks together," she said. "We are not just the industrial hub of Chicago, but the industrial hub of the midwest. But that doesn't mean we have to breathe dirty air, drink dirty water, or have dirty soil." She thanked the audience for turning out to demand accountability from government agencies that exist to protect them. "We have to be united in this fight to ensure that we're heard, that people know the Tenth Ward, that we live here, and that we're done being dumped on, and we're done being forgotten."

For the first 20 minutes of the event, the officials outlined what they knew when about manganese emanating from the S.H. Bell facility. Concerns about manganese particles in the air first began to crop up in 2014, when the city was working on legislation to force the nearby KCBX facility to remove its outdoor petcoke piles. The EPA wanted to begin monitoring the air around S.H. Bell that year, but the company fought the agency's request to install air monitors, Molly Smith of the EPA's Air Enforcement Division explained. It took a 2016 court order for five different monitors to be installed around the site.

Last summer, the EPA issued a notice of violation for high concentrations of manganese particles to S.H. Bell after collecting data for four months. With the new concerns raised by the city's soil sampling, Dave Graham of the Chicago Department of Public Health encouraged residents to take several precautions while the EPA was working to conduct more extensive soil sampling at 70 neighborhood homes over the next several weeks: regularly cleaning floors, counters, and toys with soap and water; taking off outdoor shoes when coming into homes; covering open soil in yards with grass, wood chips, or mulch; using raised beds to garden and thoroughly cleaning any vegetables or fruits picked for consumption; and not letting kids play in the dirt.

Read more: https://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2018/05/11/east-side-residents-enraged-by-manganese-pollution-tear-into-city-and-federal-officials