Woodstock town supervisor Bill McKenna didn’t change any minds at a sometimes raucous event last Saturday, October 28, about the contaminated construction debris delivered to a Shady property. But he wasn’t the main target. The folks at the question-and-answer session following the final screening of Shady Waters, a documentary by Chris Finlay, seemed united in taking state officials to task for allowing the debris to be delivered to a Shady property.
“If there was an agency … and I’m not talking about a hired consultant, an agency, that indicated that there was still an issue there, the town could go back to the owner and say, You need to complete the cleanup. If the owner refuses to do that, the town could go to court to get an order,” McKenna said. “You can’t just go in with trucks and clean that up. We can get a court order to do that. And then we could use town funding and levy it back to the property owner. The issue becomes, though, that we have to go to court and prove to a judge that there’s still an issue there,”
Members of the crowd yelled, “Do it!”
Someone yelled out, “Just do it, Bill. I’ll love you again. Just do it.”
The audience applauded.
McKenna repeatedly brought up a letter the state Department of Environmental Conservation had sent the town in June stating the DEC had determined the material did not pose any danger.
Hydrogeologist Katherine Beinkafner begged to differ. She said the DEC had looked only at a soil analysis.
“They have never looked at the groundwater data. And the groundwater data is what’s critical, because that’s what you’re drinking. And that’s what I intend to do is pound on that woman’s door and get in there and show her,” she said. “The whole town is going to be drinking bad water, and that’s the most critical thing.”
McKenna agreed. He urged as many people as possible to contact the DEC Region 3 office. He began to explain that the property has been cleaned up as far as town law and the DEC are concerned, but couldn’t finish his sentence.
“False,” yelled one person.
“That’s not right,” said Chris Bailey.
“It hasn’t been cleaned up, Bill. It’s still sitting there,” yelled yet another person.
McKenna was repeatedly asked why the town couldn’t go back to court and force a full cleanup. With the DEC stating they found no danger, he replied that it would be difficult to get a judgment in the town’s favor.
“I said to them, If there’s a problem, we can continue to clean up,” McKenna said. “If you honestly truly believe it’s clean, then we’re good. But let us know. And that’s when the letter came. The issue becomes we have to go back to a judge and convince him that there’s still a hazard.”
“Well, let’s do it. Will you help us?” Bailey asked.
McKenna said he was willing to go to the DEC.
Beinkafner said the town had to be spending money to analyze water because the fill was sitting over the town aquifer.
Randolph Horner put a lot of the blame on DEC for letting the dumping happen.
“The DEC dragged its feet, we know, about holding [Joseph] Karolys to account. It was like pulling teeth to get these emotionally and intellectually corrupt state officials to intervene but they finally did,” Horner orated. “They failed Woodstock. They failed their responsibility to the state of New York and the people of New York because they did not do the simple thing of causing every load to be documented from that point of origin, where it was found to be hazardous, to an authorized disposal site.”
Horner suggested the town go to governor Kathy Hochul and lieutenant governor Antonio Delgado.
“Let’s go,” McKenna said.
Hydrogeologist Paul Rubin said he wrote a very detailed letter with Beinkafner outlining the chemical history of what is in the fill. “And that should be enough to help persuade DEC,” he said.
Benzoanthracene, benzopyrene, benzofluorine, arsenic, barium, chromium, lead and mercury were some of the chemicals found.
He said the DEC would see that the risk to groundwater and public health “was real” if they read the document.
Toward the end of the questioning, Finlay asked why the cleanup hasn’t been placed in the town board agenda.
McKenna responded that there will be a public discussion, but it hasn’t been put on the agenda yet.
“It just hasn’t,” he said.
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