Boxer Pushing for Stricter Cleanup

U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer paid a visit on Thursday to a Chatsworth couple’s home, where she fielded questions and discussed concerns among neighbors of Rocketdyne’s Santa Susana Field Laboratory, the site of an ongoing cleanup of radioactive and chemical waste.

The Democratic legislator used the informal meeting at the home of George and Eleanore Rembaum to assure residents that she would continue pushing Boeing, Rocketdyne’s parent company, the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency to strengthen cleanup standards at the lab.

“I’m going to be all over this and continue to be a thorn in their sides,” said Boxer.

Through the years, Boxer has urged federal regulators to impose stringent EPA standards for cleanup of the hilltop lab, a former nuclear power development facility that is still used for Department of Defense-sponsored rocket engine and missile testing.

In May 2000, Boxer asked then Energy Secretary Bill Richardson to prepare a comprehensive environmental review of the site. The department decided on an environmental assessment of past and ongoing cleanup operations that would be conducted by a panel of government experts.

But Boxer has maintained that the scale of the cleanup and the severity of the contamination warrant a full environmental impact statement, which would include analysis of methodology and standards and would allow for public involvement in the process.

Residents and community leaders are concerned that too much contamination remains in the lab’s soil, posing a long-term threat to Rocketdyne workers and neighbors. A decision on what type of environmental review will be undertaken is expected later this year.

Boxer has also asked EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman to ensure that the Rocketdyne cleanup is consistent with her agency’s own standards, which are more rigorous than those established by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Whitman informed Boxer in a letter in May 2001 that the EPA was prepared to provide a thorough survey of the site.

But residents of the area told Boxer they worry because these issues remain unresolved.

“We can’t understand why they would be so reluctant to go by EPA standards,” said Barbara Johnson, a resident of Susana Knolls and member of the Rocketdyne Clean Up Committee.

Boxer listened as other residents and former Rocketdyne workers talked about how they believed the cancers they had contracted through the years may be directly related to their proximity to the lab.

“You don’t need a degree to see that people are getting sick near the site,” Boxer said.

But officials at Rocketdyne said that the lab does not pose a safety or health threat to its neighbors. They said the cleanup should be completed by 2007 or 2008. All but three of the 28 facilities formerly used for nuclear testing have been removed, said Steve Lafflam, Rocketdyne’s director for safety, health and environmental affairs.

Lafflam said he believes current cleanup standards “are protective of public health.” But he said Boeing would abide by stricter standards if necessary.

He said the company’s main goal is to finish the cleanup as soon as possible. Lafflam said to do the kind of environmental review that Boxer is advocating would delay operations by three or four years.

Those attending Thursday’s meeting said they would join with Boxer in continuing to push for stricter cleanup standards at the lab. Jeanne Londe, an 81-year-old Reseda resident, told the senator that for the first time in the 13 years that she’s been active in the contamination issue, “I feel some hope.”