Correction: Cost of Asarco cleanup still under scrutiny April 26, 2009

 Correction to article:

Where it says "but the matter was not made public until 2004, after McMurray and others came across a 1998 EPA memo obtained under the Freedom of Information Act."

It should read

but the matter was not made public until 10/2006, after McMurray, a biology teacher acting alone,  received a 1998 u.s. doj EPA asarco confidential for settlement purposes only 73 page document obtained under her Freedom of Information Act request.

 The document was released to the New York Times who covered it front page news so, in the words of former Sierra Blanca nuclear dump activist Addington, "asarco could never bury the document".

See 2009 story published under fair use at https://eliotshapleigh.com/news/print/3046-cost-of-asarco-cleanup-still-under-scrutiny

"

Cost of Asarco cleanup still under scrutiny
April 26, 2009

Some of Asarco's harshest critics in El Paso say the $52 million planned to remove contamination in El Paso is not nearly enough.

Written by Diana Wasington Valdez, The El Paso Times

EL PASO -- Some of Asarco's harshest critics in El Paso say the $52 million planned to remove contamination in El Paso is not nearly enough.

And they are asking the EPA to schedule a new public hearing to help settle the issue.

Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso, said the $52 million to remove El Paso's contamination is insufficient, and the true cost is closer to $250 million.

Shapleigh says the $52 million remediation plan for the El Paso copper smelter "does not include 250 acres of contiguous property owned by Asarco but not located at the (main) 100-acre smelter site."

Shapleigh and others who fought against Asarco's restarting smelter operations are asking the Environmental Protection Agency to conduct a public hearing in El Paso to address this and other issues.

Juliet Lozano, spokeswoman for Mayor John Cook, said "the city believes there should be a hearing in El Paso, and we are working with EPA to schedule one."

The EPA, which is seeking comments from the community, has not decided whether to convene a hearing.

Lozano said the city of El Paso has accepted the $52 million level for cleanup, and is waiting on a pending settlement to go through involving Asarco, the EPA and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

Under the settlement, Lozano said, "the smelter property would be transferred to a custodial trust for cleanup and disposition by an independent trustee, the smelter would not reopen as an operating smelter, Asarco would no longer control or own the smelter, and the custodial trust would be funded with $52 million in cash from Asarco for cleanup."

Tucson-based Asarco LLC, through a spokeswoman in El Paso, said it cannot comment on issues involving litigation or pending before the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Corpus Christi.

This week, the court said Sterlite Industries Ltd., India's largest copper producer, can buy Asarco for $1.1 billion and a $600 million note, but Grupo Mexico of Mexico City said it wants to reassume control of Asarco and offered $1.3 billion for its former subsidiary.

Asarco repeatedly has denied the smelter is responsible for the lead and arsenic contamination the EPA found in more than 1,000 residential and business properties in West and South El Paso. Asarco said the most likely culprits are pesticides containing arsenic, lead-based paint, leaded gasoline and slag, a smelting byproduct.

Exposure to high levels of lead can cause developmental problems in children, and arsenic poisoning can lead to certain cancers, according to health experts.

Get the Lead Out, a grass-roots organization in El Paso, is also asking for the smokestacks to be demolished, before another smelting operation moves in.

Water contamination

El Pasoans Juan Garza and Heather McMurray have fought for more than five years against the reopening of the smelter. Among other things, they and other activists want regulatory agencies to ensure that lead and arsenic from the plant site won't spill into the river again.

Since the fight over the smelter's air permit began, TCEQ addressed only the question of whether restarting the smelter would pollute El Paso's airshed. During the proceedings for Asarco's air permit renewal, the state agency did not consider soil and water contamination issues.

For example, a 2006 lab report by El Paso Water Utilities showed excessive levels of arsenic (404 parts per million/milligrams per liter), cadmium (67.4 ppm), lead (2,800 ppm) and mercury (1.09 ppm) were found in soil at the Asarco entrance about six weeks after El Paso experienced a major flood. The report said the substances came from Asarco's plant site, and the city took charge of the matter. The acceptable levels for these substances, respectively, are 0.01 ppm, 0.005 ppm, 0.015 ppm and 0.002 ppm.

A second report by the former Texas Water Commission in 1990 warned about the need to shore up the protective runoff structure at Asarco to prevent contaminants from spilling into the river in case of a 100-year-flood event, such as the flooding of August 2006.

A third report, one by EPA in 1997, said Texas state officials had found large concentrations of arsenic in El Paso's groundwater from discharges at the smelter.

Christina Montoya, spokeswoman for El Paso Water Utilities, said the water from the Rio Grande is safe to drink because it is treated thoroughly at the city's plants before it reaches water customers. Although the 2006 report mentions the Franklin Canal, the samples were actually taken from soil, she said.

"During the 2006 flood, the city shut down its water treatment plants," Montoya said. Utility chemical analysis reports are published each year, and they show no contamination with these four metals.

The U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission, which oversees water treaties with Mexico, filed a claim against Asarco in the U.S. bankruptcy court alleging soil and groundwater contamination "related to the historic operations of the [Asarco] smelter."

The IBWC claim seeks unspecified money to clean up the area within the American Canal and the IBWC field office across Paisano Drive from Asarco.

The smelter, which began operating 110 years ago, sits on top of a hill in West El Paso next to the river and across the border from Juárez; it has been dormant since 1999.

Contaminated soil

The saga over Asarco began in the early 1990s, when students and other researchers at the University of Texas at El Paso and New Mexico State University conducted tests at the UTEP campus, which is near Asarco. They found excessive levels of lead and arsenic in the soil.

Shapleigh, who became the principal catalyst in the battle to shut down Asarco, became interested in their findings. After talking to them, he convened a group of officials from EPA, TCEQ (then called Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission), the former El Paso City-County Health and Environmental Department and the Texas Department of Health.

The group asked EPA to examine the potential health risks to El Pasoans, and the agency set a three-mile radius from the smelter for the evaluation.

EPA tested 1,944 properties, and found some with arsenic levels as high as 81 parts per million and lead levels as high as 1,700 ppm. For the cleanup, EPA set thresholds at 24 ppm for arsenic and 500 ppm for lead.

The federal agency also said Asarco was potentially responsible for the soil contamination, which Asarco vehemently denied.

The cleanup process began with money from a $100 million environmental trust fund agreed to by Asarco, EPA and the U.S. Justice Department.

In 2002, Asarco applied with the TCEQ to renew its air quality permit, which would allow it to emit pollutants into the air, including lead, carbon monoxide, sulfuric acid and sulfur dioxide.

After considerable pressure from the community, TCEQ agreed to conduct a contested-case hearing on the permit request in El Paso in 2004.

Opponents complained the hearing focused only on air pollution, and did not allow testimony on water and soil contamination. TCEQ also limited its consideration to El Paso, and excluded testimony on how the emissions would affect residents in neighboring Juárez and New Mexico.

El Pasoan Mariana Chew, an environmental engineer and Sierra Club member, said TCEQ officials ignored the 1983 La Paz Agreement, an accord between the United States and Mexico that calls for cooperation on environmental issues along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The city of El Paso formally joined the opposition against the permit renewal, while New Mexico officials, including Gov. Bill Richardson, and Juárez city officials, also came out against the permit.

El Paso city officials spent more than $1 million on its legal case against Asarco, but last year the TCEQ's three appointed commissioners voted in favor of renewing the air permit.

Asarco opponents did not give up, and Shapleigh once more turned to the EPA regional office for help.

Earlier this year, despite the state-approved permit, EPA made it clear Asarco would need to update its equipment before it could resume smelting operations. EPA warned it might not comply with federal air quality standards without repairs and new equipment.

After that, citing falling copper prices, Asarco announced it would abandon plans to reopen the El Paso plant.

Bankruptcy

Asarco, which also faced multimillion-dollar environmental complaints in other states, was having its own problems with its parent corporation, Grupo Mexico, which had bought Asarco in 1999.

That same year, the worldwide price of copper had plummeted, prompting Asarco to suspend its smelting operations in El Paso. Later on, the price of copper would rise dramatically, making the smelter financially attractive, assuming the permit went through.

Grupo Mexico, which owned large mines in Mexico, through Asarco obtained a stake in the lucrative Southern Peru Copper Corp. Back then, its board of directors included executives from Kimberly Clark and the Carlyle Group, a global firm associated with former President George H. Bush.

But Asarco, hounded by a growing list of creditors, ended up battling against Grupo Mexico, which it accused of stripping it of its profitable stake in a Peruvian cooper mine. Asarco won the legal dispute, and on April 1, a court ordered Grupo Mexico to pay Asarco $6 billion in damages. Grupo Mexico officials have said they will appeal the ruling.

Shapleigh has said the $6 billion Asarco may receive because of the court victory is another reason Asarco should pay for the cleanup in El Paso.

During the George W. Bush administration, former Asarco employees worked at EPA's headquarters and as White House environmental advisers.

Garza, McMurray, Chew and other community activists in the region often felt that they faced enormous odds when they decided to take on Asarco, a company with friends in high places. But, they kept on fighting.

Shapleigh, who filed an open records request to obtain correspondence between TCEQ and Asarco, gave a blunt assessment of the politics.

"During the Bush administration, polluters captured and corrupted EPA, and Asarco's contacts were similar to those at the TCEQ," he said. "Routinely, polluters dump millions of dollars in political campaign contributions. Then, several months later, their permits are mysteriously approved."

TCEQ officials have denied any wrongdoing in relation to the smelter's permit process or to Shapleigh's open-records request.

After Asarco filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection four years ago, the tide began to change in favor of the smelter's opponents.

Asarco's parent company, Asarco Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Americas Mining Corp. (a subsidiary of Grupo Mexico), lost control of Asarco in 2005, when the bankruptcy court appointed an independent board to manage the company.

Questions arose over what Asarco intended to do with the El Paso smelter, and whether local taxpayers would end up having to pay for expensive cleanup bills if the copper smelter went broke.

Shapleigh tried to get El Paso officials to seek EPA Superfund status to cover the potential costs of the cleanup. However, the idea was shot down by business and government leaders who feared the status would give El Paso a black eye and scare away investors.

El Pasoan Risher Gilbert, one of the West El Paso neighbors who pushed for the EPA cleanup, said "I always felt the Asarco smelter should be a Superfund site, not the rest of the (affected) area. I'm thrilled that the smelter will not reopen. The days are over when a large smelter ought to operate in the middle of the city."

Two secrets

Shapleigh contends two public health hazards were kept hidden from the public despite previous public hearings on the Asarco permit.

He and activists opposed to Asarco unearthed the information from reams of environmental records, and fights with agencies to obtain documents under the Freedom of Information Act.

"We still need to get to the bottom of two secrets," Shapleigh said. "One was why the illegal incineration of hazardous wastes at Asarco was kept from the public, and the other is the 233 million cubic feet of contaminated groundwater plume around the smelter. We have concerns as to whether the cleanup plan will adequately address the groundwater issues."

The suspected groundwater contamination is the result of more than 100 years of smelting and other operations at the Asarco site.

McMurray, a member of Sunland Park Grassroots Environmental Coalition, said El Pasoans have a right to know what hazardous wastes were burned by Asarco at the El Paso plant site. The waste had been shipped to El Paso from the company's subsidiary Encycle Inc. in Corpus Christi.

"Records are missing, and some of us suspect some of hazardous waste contaminated our river and groundwater," she said.

According to a 2007 report of the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, Encycle received military waste from the Rocky Mountain Arsenal in Colorado, and then burned it in El Paso without a permit. Asarco denied any wrongdoing.

EPA officials said the issue involving Encycle was resolved in a $20.5 million settlement in 1999, but the matter was not made public until 2004, after McMurray and others came across a 1998 EPA memo obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

Recently, the price of copper began climbing again. China, which is making noises about changing its currency base, is buying up copper and other metals around the world for this purpose.

The Tucson-based Asarco would not say if changing market conditions will alter its plans in El Paso.

For now, it appears Asarco's fate in El Paso will be determined by the bankruptcy court, EPA and the metals market.

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Copyright © 2025 - Senator Eliot Shapleigh  •  Political Ad Paid For By Eliot Shapleigh

C8 had to be at asarco el paso

 C8 is everywhere

So, why aren't we told the levels?

Of:

1. c8
2. Dioxins
3. Actinide
4. Beta radiation (would still be here)
5. Clearly told about arsenic and lead (with honest testing)
6. The list goes on

This is a great video that was easy for people to watch

Watch great video explaining teflon and C8

Sponsors for insights museum STEM

Today's politicians and scientists should follow NASCAR's drivers' example and wear sponsors on their jackets. 

 

I sights museum gives dino track tours over land historically exposed to smelter wastes and its illegal toxic wastes 1992-1998.

When Insights takes folks on dino track tours, online it seems no one talks about the arsenic and other toxic wastes that historically exist within at least 3   miles of asarco's smelter. Or, the illegal haz wastes burned at asarco from 1992-1998 per EPA and U.S.DOJ.   

But, this site is promoted by scientists who ARE aware of the toxins.  These people should disclose these toxins to people before asking them to sign a waiver, imho. 

Children are short and lower to the ground contamination; and to any off-gassing. They also have greater surface area to body ratio.  Their parents may not realize the land is toxic according to EPA proposed superfund area and how much further toxins travel. 

To go on the tour everyone must sign a waiver

Insights dino tracks site

I hope the guides are instructing folks to stay as safe as possible. To this day the dioxin levels have not been disclosed. Lead, arsenic, beta radioactive particles, maybe actinides...  After living in smelter toxic shadow people give up and go with the flow, figuring it wont get them sick, maybe someone else. 

If you want to teach science, you need to teach scientific method, and that begins with asking honest questions to seek factual answers, not political ones.

Radiation exposure increases the chance of getting cancer, and the risk increases as the dose increases: the higher the dose, the greater the risk,” says the US Environmental Protection Agency, citing studies that follow groups of people exposed to radiation".

In 1998 EPA said el paso tx had higest beta radiation level in the usa both water and soil 

This article on bomb testing lets you know how such exposure raises chances for cancers. 

The center for public integrity 2011 " In smelter town, decades of dirty air, disease — and bureaucratic dawdling Avatar photo by Jim Morris and Emma Schwartz November 17, 2011"

[hayden became a superfund site, and it all closed down.  Then a few yrs ago after pandemic asarco reopened two closed sites, hayden being one.  Effectively, imho, what was secretly illegally smelted in el paso tx and east helena mt just moved to hayden. (To this day we do not know what those materials were).  I was told that had i not gotten the public release (10/06 nytimes) of the 1998  73 page conf for settlement purposes only u.s. DOJ, EPA asarco document that el paso tx would have reopened.]

Center for Public Integrity

Link to story

Posted in Environment

In smelter town, decades of dirty air, disease — and bureaucratic dawdling

Avatar photo

by Jim Morris and Emma Schwartz

November 17, 2011

The Asarco copper smelter looms over Hayden, Arizona. Emma Schwartz/iWatch News

Reading Time: 13 minutes

Key findings

Toxic air pollution, involving nearly 200 chemicals deemed so harmful to health Congress sought to bring emissions under control 21 years ago, persists in hundreds of U.S. communities.

About 1,600 polluters around the country are classified by the U.S. EPA as “high priority violators” of the Clean Air Act — sites regulators believe need urgent attention.

Regulators take months and sometimes years to enforce anti-pollution rules. About 400 facilities are on an internal EPA “watch list” that includes serious or chronic Clean Air Act violators that have not been subject to timely enforcement.

Regulators largely rely on an honor system easily manipulated by polluters, which report their own emissions.

Criminal cases usually don’t target big polluters. Relatively few cases have led to penalties since 1990 – and only a handful involving air toxics.

HAYDEN, Ariz. — As Betty Amparano sees it, the failures that all but ruined this wisp of a town occurred on multiple levels.

A copper smelter failed to keep toxic air pollution in check. The state failed to lean on the smelter’s owner, Asarco. And the federal government failed, until days ago, to override the state.

“The bottom line is that the whole town is contaminated,” said Amparano, who was born in Hayden and has lived here most of her life.

Soil tainted by airborne metals has been excavated from hundreds of yards. In some families, generations claim to have suffered ill effects from bad air. Deaths from cancer are common. Regulators have done little; for people who live here, the sense of betrayal is profound.

On Nov. 10, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency moved against Asarco for what the EPA describes as more than six years of illegal emissions of arsenic, lead, chromium and seven other dangerous compounds from the smelter. The agency issued an unpublicized administrative action that could result in millions of dollars in fines from Asarco for allegedly being in “continuous violation” of the Clean Air Act since June 2005. The action is a slap at both the company and the state — another measure of failure.

YouTube video

Asarco says its emissions are within legal limits and promises to “vigorously” contest the EPA’s claims. The head of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) calls the federal filing a “paperwork exercise” and an “attempt by the EPA to make it seem as if the state of Arizona has done nothing when, in fact, that is not true.” At the same time, he acknowledges the state has been too slow to act.

People in Hayden just want someone to do something about the air.

Known risks, government inaction

When it comes to toxic air pollution, help often arrives late. As an investigation by the Center for Public Integrity’s iWatch News and NPR has shown, the EPA itself maintains an internal watch list that catalogs the extent of foot-dragging by state environmental agencies entrusted by Washington to protect public health. Some agencies fail to crack down on known polluters for months or years. The Asarco smelter, while not on the watch list, is among more than 1,600 facilities the EPA considers “high priority violators” of the Clean Air Act — sites that regulators believe need urgent attention.

Here, government inaction goes back decades.

Amparano started a lawsuit against Asarco in the late 1990s — since settled — that came to include more than 200 plaintiffs. She welcomes the federal intervention but wishes it had come sooner. She’d like to ask the EPA, “Why the hell did you take so long?”

Since 1912, Hayden, population barely 900, has been both blessed and cursed by the presence of the smelter, fed by Asarco’s massive, open-pit Ray Mine 20 miles up the road. The smelter and mine have brought with them a precious commodity in this barren stretch of southeastern Arizona an hour north of Tucson — jobs. The jobs may have come at a steep price.

Asarco has spent the past three years cleaning up Hayden. On order of the EPA, the company has paid millions for the removal and replacement of dirt in the yards of nearly 300 residents because the soil was contaminated with arsenic, which can cause cancer, and lead, which can disrupt brain function.

Asarco’s smelter turns ore into nearly pure copper bars. The EPA alleges the company has been in “continuous violation” of the Clean Air Act for excessive emissions of arsenic, lead and other metals since 2005. (Emma Schwartz)

And yet emissions from the smelter and dust blown from a 2,000-acre tailings pile — an ever-expanding mountain of mining waste — continue to deposit those same metals and other poisons on this poor, mostly Latino community.

It’s hard to escape Asarco’s footprint. The smelter’s 1,000-foot smokestack is visible from anywhere in town. A community playground and swimming pool lie just yards from the plant’s fence.

Asarco has long maintained — and the state concurs — that the Hayden smelter is not a “major source” of hazardous air pollutants, a designation that could force the company to install costly controls. The EPA disagrees, saying in its Nov. 10 filing that Asarco “has failed and continues to fail to comply” with federal rules applying to big polluters.

“There is no simple paperwork violation,” Jared Blumenfeld, the EPA’s regional administrator in San Francisco, told iWatch News and NPR. “We feel very comfortable, based on the science, that the Hayden Asarco facility is a major source and therefore needs to comply with the Clean Air Act by putting control technologies on.”

Amparano and her older sister, Mary Corona, have inventoried what they describe as a staggering amount of death and disease in Hayden: Middle-aged people and children who succumbed to cancer. Kids with asthma and young adults who may be suffering the effects of childhood lead exposures.

News from our partners

 

NPR and affiliate coverage

 

“EPA Takes Action Against Toxic Arizona Copper Plant,” by Howard Berkes: featured on Morning Edition

“EPA Regulations Give Kilns Permission To Pollute,” by Howard Berkes: featured on Morning Edition

“A Family’s Fight To Clear The Air,” by Sarah Harris and Howard Berkes

“Secret ‘Watch List’ Reveals Failure To Curb Toxic Air,” by Elizabeth Shogren: featured on Morning Edition

“Powdery Pollution Coats Oklahoma Town,” by Howard Berkes and Sandra Bartlett: featured on All Things Considered

“Texas’ Lax Pollution Enforcement Leads Harris County to Take Action” by Dave Fehling, State Impact project

“Poisoned Places: Seven of the Worst Offenders in Florida” by Steve Newborn, WMFE 90.7 Orlando

“TCEQ’s Approach Is Under Fire” by Mose Buchele, KUHF 88.7 Houston

 

Related content from the Investigative News Network

 

“Florida Home to Seven Air Polluters on EPA Watch List,” by Trevor Aaronson and Mc Nelly Torres, Florida Center for Investigative Reporting

“Seattle glass recycler Saint-Gobain leads list of NW companies fined for violating Clean Air Act,” by Robert McClure and Lisa Stiffler, Investigate West

“EPA enforcement often brings more hot air than heat,” by B. Poole, Tucson Sentinel

“Enviro group sues EPA to list Tucson among air quality danger zones,” by B. Poole, Tucson Sentinel

“Under legal pressure, Wisconsin coal-fired power plants curb emissions,” by Sarah Karon and Lauren Hasler, Wisconsin Center for Investigative Reporting

The pollution and the risks have been well known to regulators for years.

A 1980 memo by a state environmental official noted that the Hayden smelter has “problems with lead and arsenic fumes during their process because of the type of ore they receive … There is still a large amount of fugitive gas escaping.”

Concerns about fugitive emissions — from parts of the smelter other than the smokestack — continued. In 2009, the EPA reported that “air monitoring in [Hayden] has shown levels of arsenic, lead and chromium still exceeding public health standards, probably due to toxic fumes escaping from leaks in the plant” — an assertion Asarco disputes.

Asarco acknowledges discharging arsenic, lead, sulfuric acid and other pollutants from the smelter but accepts no blame for anyone’s poor health. “There’s no reason to be alarmed,” said Joseph Wilhelm, general manager of the company’s Hayden operations. Nonetheless, Asarco, which emerged from bankruptcy in 2009 and now is reaping the benefits of soaring copper prices, has promised to do better. In a statement to iWatch News and NPR, the company said it is investing $9 million to “significantly reduce not only lead emissions but other [hazardous air] emissions including arsenic and chromium.”

The EPA seems unimpressed.

In a letter on July 27, the agency chastised Asarco for not taking the Hayden cleanup more seriously, saying the company seemed more interested in justifying its lack of cooperation than in “providing any attempt at compliance.” Asarco is contesting the EPA’s allegations through a dispute resolution process.

In a letter to Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer on Nov. 8, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson wrote that air monitoring this year had measured lead levels in Hayden at up to three times the federal standard.

The Team

This project is a collaboration between the Center for Public Integrity and NPR.

Lead reporter: Jim Morris

 

 

Data analysts: Elizabeth Lucas (CPI) and Robert Benincasa (NPR)

 

 

Reporting team: Chris Hamby, Ronnie Greene, Kristen Lombardi, Corbin Hiar (CPI), Howard Berkes, Sandra Bartlett and Elizabeth Shogren (NPR)

 

 

Images and video: Emma Schwartz (CPI), John Poole and David Gilkey (NPR)

 

 

Web team: Cole Goins, Ajani Winston, Sarah Whitmire, Erik Lincoln (CPI) and Alicia Cypress and Nelson Hsu (NPR)

 

 

Research: Barbara Van Woerkom (NPR) and Devorah Adler (CPI)

 

 

Also contributing: Rachael Marcus, Paul Abowd, Alexandra Duszak (CPI) and Quinn Ford (NPR)

 

 

Data editor: David Donald

 

 

NPR editor: Susanne Reber

 

 

Project editor: Keith Epstein

 

 

And in its Nov. 10 “finding of violation,” the EPA alleged that Asarco has, among other things, failed to comply with emissions limits since 2005.

The federal government, which allows states to be the primary enforcers of the Clean Air Act, has largely deferred to Arizona’s regulatory agency. Despite the EPA’s allegations, Asarco has faced few repercussions for its activities in Hayden. A spokesman for the ADEQ said the company over the last five years has paid a single, $77,500 air pollution fine — for blowing dust from the tailings pile.

Asarco is owned by a Mexico City-based mining and smelting conglomerate, Grupo México, which reported what it called “record results” for 2010 — more than $8 billion in sales, a 67-percent increase over 2009. Copper sales alone totaled $5.3 billion, up from $2.7 billion.

A company town

Workers have been gouging copper ore from the Ray Mine since 1880. Asarco began processing the ore at its Hayden smelter in 1912, turning out 800-pound slabs of nearly pure copper called anodes.

“Without Asarco, the town of Hayden wouldn’t be able to exist,” said Mayor Monica Badillo, an operator with the company. “We get a lot of our tax revenue from the mine, so that’s what helps us continue to thrive. Every bit of copper that they sell, we get sales tax on that.”

Mary Corona and her sister, Betty, were born in 1958 and 1959, respectively. They grew up with four siblings in Hayden’s barrio, known as San Pedro. Mary recalls having bloody noses and fevers as a child and recurring sores on her torso that looked like cigarette burns. She and Betty would play in a gully — an arroyo — behind their home and apply purple and pink residue to their faces as pretend makeup. That residue, they now believe, was a toxic byproduct of Asarco wastewater.

Huge dust clouds from the tailings pile were common in the 1960s, Mary said. “It was so bad we couldn’t see our hands in front of our faces.” Acid from the smelter would eat the paint off of cars, and Asarco sometimes would reimburse the owners.

By the 1970s, unsettling research on smelter towns, including Hayden, was appearing in the medical literature. A 1977 article in the American Journal of Epidemiology found, for example, that “chronic absorption of arsenic, lead, and cadmium by persons living near smelters, particularly by such potentially vulnerable groups such as young children and pregnant women, may be causing undetected, latent disease that will become manifest in the future.” The authors studied 19 communities in all, 11 with copper smelters.

Hair samples taken from children in Hayden showed the second-highest levels of arsenic among the 11 towns; only Anaconda, Mont., was worse.

In 1990, the Arizona Department of Health Services found elevated lung cancer death rates in the Gila Basin, which includes Hayden. “The cause of the elevation remains to be explained,” the department said. “Data is lacking concerning the incidence of cigarette smoking, and the levels of exposure to arsenic or other potential carcinogens.”

Passage of the Clean Air Act amendments that same year sharpened regulators’ focus on air toxics — nearly 200 hazardous chemicals that could cause cancer, birth defects and other ailments. Beginning in 1991, two inspectors with the ADEQ, Dave Kempson and Mike Traubert, went after Asarco aggressively, regularly writing up the company for so-called opacity violations. High opacity — the degree to which air is impenetrable to light — can be an indicator of excessive particulate emissions, which can include arsenic, lead and other harmful metals.

Reports by Kempson and Traubert in 1991 and 1992 — obtained by iWatch News from ADEQ files — describe dense plumes of smoke emanating from the smelter. The violations added up, but Asarco pushed back. In a June 7, 1991, letter to the ADEQ, the company complained, “Your office seems intent on creating an adversarial relationship with a company that has consistently cooperated in efforts to improve air quality in this community.”

In recent interviews with iWatch News in Phoenix, Kempson and Traubert — no longer with the agency — recalled hoping to build a major enforcement case against Asarco. Unannounced inspections often turned up violations. “We would then document those violations and write a letter [to Asarco],” Kempson said, “and more often than not would get a rebuttal from the company’s law firm.”

Traubert said that Asarco would “explain [an air release] away as an extraordinary event” — unusual and uncontrollable. “It strained credulity a bit,” he said.

Ultimately, Traubert said, the hoped-for case against Asarco “kind of languished. I don’t have a good explanation of why it didn’t go any farther. Within our group we certainly had the perception that you tangle with the mines with care.”

Blood tests and litigation

In 1997, Betty Amparano was asked to renew her lease on the house she’d been renting in Hayden. The house was on Terrace Drive, on a hill near the tailings pile. The lease included a caveat: The house was contaminated with metals-laden dust.

Amparano took her seven children to the doctor for blood tests. All had blood lead levels above what the federal government considered to be safe. Erin, then 5, and Ray, then 8, had levels more than four times higher than the limit. Even relatively low lead exposures have been associated with diminished IQs, learning disabilities and other neurological problems.

Erin Amparano, now 19, said she still suffers from the lead that entered her blood. “I have trouble sleeping at night,” she said. “I’m always really hyper. I get rashes and headaches. I had difficulty learning, and it was real hard for me to pay attention. I’m still like that to this day.” She has two young daughters of her own. “If I had a choice, I wouldn’t be here,” she said.

A local newspaper published a story about the Amparanos’ plight in 1997, catching the attention of Steve Brittle, leader of a Phoenix-based environmental group called Don’t Waste Arizona. During his first visit to Hayden, “I was absolutely horrified,” Brittle said. “I didn’t think anything like this could exist in America. It didn’t seem like it could be possible with the environmental laws.”

Brittle connected the Amparanos and other Hayden residents with a lawyer in Tempe, Ariz., Howard Shanker, who began pulling together a class-action lawsuit against Asarco. More than 200 people eventually signed on, alleging they had suffered health effects from Asarco’s noxious emissions. Shanker commissioned tests for lead and arsenic. “A lot of people” came back with high levels, he said. “Clearly, it was attributable to Asarco emissions and operations.” Asarco denied any responsibility.

The lawsuit dragged on. In 1999, researchers with the University of Arizona tested the blood of 14 infants and young children for lead and found “no evidence of excessive … exposure.” The same group found elevated levels of arsenic in the urine of five of 224 people tested and speculated that “exposure to house dust may have been a contributing factor.” The study was partially funded by Asarco, and some residents were leery of its findings.

In 2002, the Arizona Department of Health Services reported that the main worry in Hayden was spikes in sulfur dioxide that “occasionally pose a short-term health hazard to sensitive asthmatics. … Other exposures to contaminants in other environmental media do not appear to pose a public health hazard.”

In 2005, Asarco declared bankruptcy, effectively ending the lawsuit. The plaintiffs settled for a large amount of money overall, but an average of less than $10,000 per family. Not enough to move away. “There were people that tried and still couldn’t do it,” Betty Amparano said. “And people that did move out are starting to come back because of the economy.”

The EPA intervenes

Prodded by environmental activist Brittle and others, the EPA came to Hayden as the lawsuit was winding down. In 2007, before it ordered Asarco to start digging up soil, the agency found arsenic levels within safe limits in only one of 99 yards sampled. Seventeen of 22 attics yielded dust samples high in arsenic; 15 attics had dust high in copper, eight in lead.

Asarco, still in bankruptcy, agreed to set aside $13.5 million to fund the cleanup, which began in December 2008. At last count, soil from more than 266 yards had been dug up and replaced. In its statement to iWatch News, Asarco said it “has completed the cleanup of the soils on residential properties, public areas and vacant lots” in both Hayden and the adjoining town of Winkelman, “and, in doing so, achieved all the required cleanup levels.”

In July, however, the EPA notified Asarco that its plan for doing additional cleanup work in Hayden had “serious deficiencies,” including a lack of “meaningful” air sampling.

Several residents said that they, too, are unhappy with Asarco’s performance. In August, the company bought Monica Fernandez’s mother’s home, almost directly under a conveyor belt that carries crushed ore. “They had a big old crane that smashed the whole house,” Fernandez said. “All they did was knock it down, wet the dirt and put the rocks there.” The contamination, she suspects, is still there. “It has to be,” she said. “They covered it with the same dirt.”

Amid concerns about the cleanup, Asarco is seeking renewal of its air permit — its license to pollute. The federal government allows states to grant such permission, and ADEQ officials say they plan to affirm Asarco’s status as a minor source of hazardous air pollutants.

Asarco insists that it doesn’t meet the legal threshold for a major source: emissions of 10 tons per year of an individual chemical listed under the Clean Air Act amendments, or a combination of such chemicals totaling 25 tons annually. The company says it puts out a total of 14 tons of air toxics. And the highest amount of any one compound it reported emitting in 2010 — arsenic — was just 3.8 tons.

The EPA’s view is quite different – and could have significant implications. In its Nov. 10 finding of violation, the EPA argues that the Hayden smelter has been a major source since June 13, 2005, the date a federal pollution-control standard for copper smelters took effect. As of that date, the EPA alleges, “the Hayden Smelter had the potential to emit 10 [tons per year] or greater of Arsenic and Lead Compounds, individually, and 25 [tons per year] or greater of a combination of [hazardous air pollutants].”

Understating emissions can enable companies to avoid expensive fixes. Eric Schaeffer, former head of the EPA’s Office of Civil Enforcement, said Asarco is, in effect, being accused of dropping out of the regulatory system. “If you basically keep yourself out of the system, then you’re able to bypass [pollution] standards and avoid compliance and save a lot of money,” said Schaeffer, now executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project, which litigates against polluters. “And that, obviously, is a fundamental violation of the Clean Air Act.”

In its statement, Asarco described the EPA action as “unexpected … [and] even more puzzling because our smelter is in compliance with its air permit. In Asarco’s view, the [finding of violation] is simply incorrect.”

ADEQ Director Henry Darwin said that Asarco’s new permit will force the company to make improvements. He expressed regret that it’s taken 10 years to act: “I fully acknowledge the fact that we should have issued [a permit with more stringent requirements] quicker than we have,” Darwin said.

“I do share your concern about what emissions from this smelter could be doing to that community. We’re not sitting idly by to see what Asarco’s going to do.”

Betty Amparano’s 32-year-old daughter, Jill Corona, is skeptical. Corona, a Hayden native who lives in Tempe, called the EPA’s action “bittersweet. In some ways, it’s great that the pollution problem is now finally being acknowledged. But for many years, it seemed to be implied that there was not really a problem.”

She worries about future generations. The EPA’s case against Asarco could be tied up in court for several years, with no guarantee that the government will prevail. And even if the Hayden area is deemed to be out of compliance with the federal air standard for lead, the state could have up to five years to bring down levels of the pollutant. In the meantime, exposures will continue.

“You know, I have a cousin who’s dying of cancer,” Corona said. “Whose health is being affected today? For the residents that are living [in Hayden] now, it’s not like a water faucet that gets shut off and that’s it, that’s the end of it and you’re done. It’s not that simple.”

Howard Berkes, NPR’s rural affairs correspondent, contributed to this story.

Tagged:Content ok, Legacy, Title ok

Jim Morris

A journalist since 1978, Jim Morris has won more than 80 awards for his work, including the George Polk... More by Jim Morris

When the el paso asarco stacks came down (articles)

Link to articles 

Dusty days are worse than they thought

 https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/03/250331151246.htm

"Science News magazine

from research organizations

The proportion of harmful substances in particulate matter is much higher than assumed

Date:

March 31, 2025

Source:

University of Basel

Summary:

People breathing contaminated air over the course of years are at greater risk of developing numerous diseases. This is thought to be due to highly reactive components in particulate matter, which affect biological processes in the body. However, researchers have now shown that precisely these components disappear within hours and that previous measurements therefore completely underestimate the quantities in which they are present"

Fresno County plans to inspect biological research labs. It follows Reedley crisis December 12, 2023

https://costa.house.gov/

Fresno County plans to inspect biological research labs. It follows Reedley crisis

December 12, 2023 

In The News

The Fresno Bee

Still reeling from the discovery a year ago of a biological laboratory operating secretly – and illegally – in the city of Reedley, Fresno County supervisors unanimously gave initial approval to an ordinance requiring annual inspections of any privately-funded biological research labs that are not regulated under federal law.

The new “Fresno County Infectious Materials Ordinance” passed on a 5-0 vote Tuesday, paving the way for a second reading and final approval on Jan. 9.

Joe Prado, the county’s assistant health department director, said inspections could begin as soon as February or March in cities that ink agreements with Fresno County for health inspectors to conduct unannounced visits to check on their compliance with regulations for biological or infectious disease materials or hazardous waste.

The new ordinance would not apply to labs at hospitals, medical clinics or doctors offices, or commercial diagnostic testing labs, which are already regulated under the federal Clinical Laboratories Improvement Amendments law, or those that have been issued waivers to those regulations.

But it would apply to private labs that receive no public funds for their work. “We don’t think there are a lot of these private labs, but we’re going to find out under this ordinance,” Public Health Director David Luchini said.

WHAT TRIGGERED THIS ORDINANCE?

It was in December 2022 when Jesalyn Harper, a code enforcement officer with the city of Reedley, noticed a green garden hose sticking through the back exterior wall of a large warehouse in the heart of downtown, a code violation. In an inspection, Harper noticed dozens of refrigerators and freezers and an array of laboratory equipment in storage, as well as hundreds of laboratory mice. She also spotted other code violations including electrical modifications made to provide power to the refrigerators and freezers.

The lab was later discovered to be linked to a pair of Chinese-owned companies, Univeral Meditech Inc. and Prestige Biotech Inc., that were operating without a business license after abruptly relocating from Fresno following a dispute with their landlord.

Eventually, collaborative inspections by city, county, state and federal agencies resulted in the closure of the warehouse in March 2023. Among the materials discovered in the lab were an array of viral, bacterial and parasitic agents including chlamydia, E. coli, streptococcus, Hepatitis B and C, human herpes, HIV (the virus that causes AIDS), rubella [measles] and malaria,  [also ebola, sars cov2 and others marked in Chinese - that CDC refused to handle and asked they be destroyed, i suppose]  as well as numerous laboratory chemicals and cases upon cases of various medical testing kits, including pregnancy tests and COVID-19 tests.

Ultimately, investigations led to the arrest in October of the alleged operator of the lab, a Chinese resident named Jia Bei Zhu, who also goes by the name David He. He faces federal charges of manufacturing and distributing misbranded medical devices and making false statements to federal investigators. Zhu remains in the Fresno County Jail as his case moves through the federal court process.

The discovery of the biological agents at an unlicensed lab stirred a furor of concern, not only for public safety from possible contamination from the materials, but also exposed what Reedley city leaders and county officials described as a loophole in federal laboratory regulations, from which privately funded labs are exempt.

PLUGGING A REGULATORY LOOPHOLE

Earlier this year, the city of Fresno took its own steps to adopt an ordinance requiring code-enforcement inspections of private biological laboratories in an effort to prevent a planned return to Fresno by Universal Meditech.

With Tuesday’s action, county health officials expressed hoped that others among Fresno County’s 15 incorporated cities would enter agreements to allow county inspectors to conduct visits to labs that would fall under the new ordinance in each city. Prado said it will be up to each city to scrutinize operating statements from companies obtaining business tax permits for any references to laboratory operations. The county will provide cities with a link to a national database website of CLIA-regulated labs. “If they’re not on that list, they can refer them to us” for inspections, Prado said.

“There’s going to have to be training in every city that signs on for what to look for,” Prado said. “It’s going to be like a welcome package for the cities that sign on.”

In instances like the Reedley lab, however, in which the operator surreptitiously moved in without getting a business license from the city, it will require each community’s code-enforcement inspectors to keep an eye out for unusual activity. “We all have to be vigilant in our communities,” Prado said. “If there’s a new business or something going on, and people see medical waste trucks, that could be something. … It’s going to be the code enforcement officers out there looking, and if they see something, they can refer it to us” for inspections.

Beside annual inspections, there will be annual site certifications to ensure that labs are operating in compliance with their various permits, Luchini said. “If they don’t have a permit, it means this lab is out of compliance” and subject to operations being suspended or shut down.

PUSHING FOR FEDERAL LAB LEGISLATION

While the local ordinance is a step for Fresno County, it will carry no weight for other counties either in California or across the country. That’s why Zieba and others are advocating for federal legislation to extend the CLIA regulations to cover privately operated labs.

“Why we want national legislation is that is not just to protect us from the Prestige Biotechs and Universal Meditechs,” Zieba said Tuesday, “but if Congress doesn’t take action to have a blanket regulation covering the country, what this country will end up with is a patchwork of regulations that will harm private research and development labs.”

Zieba described the new Fresno County ordinance as “an incredibly important stop-gap measure, a step to keep this county safe while we wait for the federal government to keep our nation safe.”

In a video message, Rep. Jim Costa, D-Fresno, said a report by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party on the Reedley lab investigation also noted gaps in federal law “that really allow bad actors to take advantage of the current system.”

Costa added that he is working with other members of Congress to strengthen federal oversight of private labs and greater accountability for federal agencies tasked with enforcing the regulations.

In the meantime, however, Costa said, “this ordinance really will provide a template for other counties throughout California and working throughout the country to ensure we have a seamless effort of oversight for public safety between the local, state and federal officials."

Pdf Asbestos in Talc (and other minerals) Breakout Session B November 28, 2018

 "Asbestos in Talc Breakout Session B November 28, 2018

Nov 28, 2018 — bentonite asbestos, another amphibole, implicated in the. 15. Ural ... "

U.S. Food and Drug Administration (.gov)

https://www.fda.gov

PDF

PDF: (asarco el paso had asbestos on site) Asbestos in Talc Breakout Session B November 28, 2018

2006 lead (Pb) values

 See the 2006 lead (Pb) values, the beryllium, mercury, arsenic etc found at canal street water plant, a secondary treatment plant that SPEG (sunland park environmental group, led by taylor moore esq) kids were told pumped water to holding tank up mountain for distribution. 

May 25, 2016 Email Response from Heather McMurray to Site Trustee, Roberto Puga Email Subject Heading: RE: Isotopes at Asarco El Paso site

 May 25, 2016

Email Response from Heather McMurray to Site Trustee, Roberto Puga

Email Subject Heading: RE: Isotopes at Asarco El Paso site

https://www.recastingthesmelter.com/?p=5024

Dear Mr. Puga,

Thank you for responding.

The El Paso ASARCO site DID smelt nuclear control rod materials. That data was given to TCEQ, EPA and US DOJ many years ago.

The clean up Trust was exempt by the bankruptcy court from testing for ANY radioactive materials.

I asked why we have not ever been given the levels of any of the isotopes listed in the attached picture: i.e. ANY radioactive isotopes. You did not answer.

The 1998 EPA US DOJ ASARCO 73 page confidential for settlement purposes only document lists many invoices at the back. The Trust never reviewed that set of invoices, nor were these ever released to anyone.

Equipment was power washed and sold with stipulation that any testing for radioactive material be done by the buyer.

You out-right refused to run free radon tests on site. You out right refused to allow collection of any of the distillation unit’s slag. No one has tested the WWII old lead dump (where the lead smelter’s waste was deposited) for by products of wulfenite smelting.

And these examples are only a few of the many.

There is a COMPLETE absence of data from the people formerly and currently in control of the site concerning these matters.

A COMPLETE silence: NO data.

It is very glaring. What you wrote me does not concern testing for or providing this data to el paso citizens.

You categorically state that no radioactive wastes (not talking NORM) were smelted here, when that is not true. Plus you mention the smelting of NORM waste, which can be more toxic than controlled High level radioactive wastes.

Then you end your reply by stating that the site is not above regulatory levels for radioactivity: have you tested for that and where is your data ?

A single alpha particle is more toxic than the arsenic that is listed as a chemical of concern.

It is unbelievable that you sent me NO DATA in your reply.

It is a complete silence concerning the high level radioactive wastes that ASARCO , engelhard and Dupont sent here for burning. Each of them were U.S. DOE high level radioactive radioactive waste disposal contractors; and, each of them listed as sending illegal materials here for burning.

The nuclear control rod material measurements should come from our government and contractors….NOT from citizen action.

You know that the slag offgases, and that capping with clean soil and asphalt is not protective of long term exposure on that site. And you know that turning the primary arroyo into a dump, when the hugely toxic arsenic bubble exists beneath and according to TCEQ has reached the rio grande, is not protective of our public health.

Selling this site, even to a government body like UTEP, will not make it safe. I believe you know that, Mr. Puga, and I belive you care enough to speak up.

If you do not, then you leave a legacy for your family a hundred years from now of covering up something you could have exposed. That is a sad legacy, followed with the people who will grow up poisoned, with teratogenic birth defects and diseases associated with long term exposure to even low level radioactive wastes.

You have to have known this. I write this letter so future generations will know that buck stopped at your desk;and, that instead of coming clean about ASARCO’s role here as a HLRW (high level radioactive waste) U.S DOE official disposal contractor, you perpetuated the cover up. Not for just Asarco, but for several other such U.S. DOE contractors whom were caught sending illegal wastes here to ASARCO for burning (engelhard and dupont).

This entire site SHOULD NOT BE DEVELOPED.

Sincerely,

H. Mcmurray, m.s. biological sciences

PUBLIC SCOPING MEETING #2 COMMENT AND RESPONSE REPORT Loop 375 Border Highway West Extension Project December 8, 2011

See my comments (mcmurray)

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://ftp.txdot.gov/pub/txdot-info/elp/projects/border_highway_west/summary_120811.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiXmuCWrJiLAxUfHEQIHfRqOYcQFnoECBEQAQ&usg=AOvVaw0pHCsFDzXhN2_LeaXIys0I

PUBLIC SCOPING MEETING #2 COMMENT AND RESPONSE REPORT

Loop 375 Border Highway West Extension Project

December 8, 2011

"I've been researching ASARCO for seven years now. I have a 

master's in biology, I'm a certified high school science teacher. I 

was a member of Get the Lead Out when we went to the air 

hearing for ASARCO's permit in 2005, and kept researching 

ASARCO working with the group in Sunland Park called the 

Sunland Park Grassroots Environmental Group. 

We discovered that people weren't being told everything about the contamination at ASARCO. And in 2006 I was able to get a 73-

page confidential for settlement purposes only EPA/federal 

Department of Justice/ASARCO document from the -- someone in 

the Department of Justice under a Texas Public Information Act 

request. 

The document told us that in no uncertain terms that ASARCO 

had been running a multistate illegal, unpermitted hazardous 

waste incinerator for almost ten years, maybe longer. We know 

that they ran it between 1991 pre-ConTop -- the ConTop 

furnaces, spelled C-0-N-T-0-P. They had the world's two largest 

ConTop furnaces from -- so from 1991 to 1998. 

Representative Reyes went on record with the El Paso Times 

after I got this document in 2006. He said that ASARCO had paid 

millions on the condition that the details of what it had done 

would never become public. We've been after the details now 

since I got that document in 2006. It's been five years. We've 

dealt with two different EPA administrations, the recent one for 

two years, and we still don't have the details of what they did. 

We are still asking for the manifests that were listed by number --

ID number in that confidential 1998 document. 

If TxDOT, the EPA, TCEQ and other companies and agencies -- for 

instance, Grupo Mexico who bought ASARCO in 1999 -- if all of 

them had to deal with the facts publicly, the details of what 

ASARCO had done, none of this would be possible. None of this 

highway development by or through ASARCO could happen 

without the proper cleanup. In other words, they're getting away 

with ignoring some pretty toxic material, and this happened 

because the federal Department of Justice allowed the ASARCO 

bankruptcy court to skip, go -- to skip or ignore the ASARCO 

liability from the materials it handled between 1991 and 1998. 

They were never discussed during the bankruptcy, never brought up in the bankruptcy and they were never assigned any damage, 

you know, the payment that they had to make to remediate 

these materials. 

It was, as Representative Reyes said, that they had made a deal 

to keep the details secret. And we believe that it's because we 

now know ASARCO was disposing of Department of Energy 

wastes and so were several of the companies caught sending 

materials here to El Paso for illegal incineration. So every time 

they move dirt in this area, every time anyone works in this area, 

anytime anyone drinks water taken from this area we run a risk 

of encountering one of those hazardous wastes that nobody 

wants to talk about and that they refuse to test for. 

What's happening is that they want this land development so bad 

and they want the port of entries developed so badly and the 

railroads to go through and all this development to happen that 

everyone is willing to just ignore the fact that ASARCO burned 

the stuff for nearly ten years, it's here and that ignoring it isn't 

going to make it go away. And if they want to construct these 

highways properly, if the EPA wants to deliver honest science, 

then they will tell us what these materials are instead of 

spending over-- almost $500,000 on testing and not finding 

anything is what's happening with the cleanup. They would 

spend 20,000 to get a complete list of the metals present at the 

site like at least one resident has done here, and they haven't 

done it. 

They refuse to let us get samples of a distillation unit that 

handled the water for the entire plant that was removing low 

level radioactive waste from the plant's process water. And then 

when they demolished it, got rid of it, sold off the metal, 

whatever, then they said to us, Tell us where to test to find this 

stuff. So what they're doing is getting rid of the stuff and making it harder for the average citizen to ever be able to prove the stuff 

is floating around down there. 

And we rely on our government to deliver honest services, to 

provide honest science, to disclose what hazardous materials are 

present, and I was really sad to see on one of these charts that 

some of the options going through or near the ASARCO site claim 

that there weren't hazardous materials present. And I'm like, 

How can they say that? Everything within nine miles of the 

smelter is contaminated. 

And if you look at the ASARCO Tacoma, Washington, smelter, 

their contamination went out 30 miles. So it's a bad situation. We 

do need transportation options, but we should be planning these 

with the knowledge of what we're actually dealing with, not just 

ignoring the problem that is there. 

They're going to end up putting these roads in that they've 

shown here, they've discussed it with city council. Representative 

Pickett said that he would hold ASARCO's feet to the fire and he 

never did. They claim that voters get to vote on these options, 

they claim that this is a public hearing when it's a series of charts 

and you get to make comments and the comments are never 

really -- never really make any impact on these designs. They' do 

what they want to do. 

The area along Executive drive, west of Executive drive, has 

already been platted and building has started there. All that the 

city will recognize it's contaminated with is lead and it goes on 

like that. I don't see how they can build here and protect the 

workers building the highway and protect the residents' children 

who will move into the area and protect the drivers driving 

through from being exposed to this stuff for the next hundred 

years unless they spend the money that they want to spend making this highway on remediation of the site instead. 

I heard that it will cost over 600 million to build all this. Well, why 

aren't they spending the 600 million to clean up the ASARCO site 

correctly and to protect our river from the plume that's 

underneath ASARCO that's impinging upon the canal in the Rio 

Grande as we speak? Why aren't they spending the money that 

way? Why are they bringing more people in, creating a traffic jam 

at this spot by building all these other parts of the outer circle 

around El Paso and leaving this to last so that people -- there's 

this -- going to be a traffic jam. And people will want it built 

simply out of desperation because they can't get anywhere. 

I think that the engineers involved aren't chemical engineers. I 

think that the people in our government who have worked for 

previous administrations and now this one don't care and I think 

that it's wrong to build roads through this, disturb it, have 

railroads going through it, have people living on it. And some day, 

it may take a hundred years but -- you know, it's wrong to disturb 

it. It should be left alone and made into a no man's land until it 

has proper cleanup. 

The EPA wants it demolished -- ASARCO demolished as fast as 

possible, to have it paved over to reduce the chances of our 

exposure, but they won't say exposure to what. They're being 

gagged by what Representative Reyes described, the millions that 

ASARCO paid on that deal to keep the details secret. And yet 

we're being exposed to this stuff and the people who build this 

highway are too and the workers presently cleaning up ASARCO 

are also. And it's a real shame. Why can't we down here along 

the border get the same kind of expertise, the same kind of 

access to science, the same kind of access to well thought out 

projects that consider all their actual information, not just what 

contractors want us to hear? Why on the border is it always this  way? 

It's extremely frustrating to me. This is an environmental sacrifice 

zone, environmental justice zone. It is being ignored by the EPA, 

it's being ignored by the TCEQ and now it's being ignored by 

TxDOT, and it's not being ignored by the community. Some day 

someone's going to be accountable for the children who grow up 

here who will be able to say they've only lived here and they're 

neighbor only lived here and they grew up and they have all 

these horrible things happening to them. And it -- it's just a 

legacy that we don't deserve down here. We don't -- we 

shouldn't have to live with. 

They should be getting this -- the kind -- they should be getting 

public comment before they start to design all this intricate stuff, 

and they're not. It's all about people making money instead of 

spending the money on our future generations, wisely growing 

children who are healthy and removing the costs that we have to 

deal with for children who have behavioral disorders, learning 

disabilities, the social costs that go with that. It's wrong to pass 

those costs on to families just so that contractors can make more 

money planning all this."

  

Holloman air force base pfas

[holloman air force base sent materials to our region for disposal either at asarco or the regional dump]

"New Mexico

Health advisory issued for anyone eating, capturing wildlife at Holloman Lake

by: Dave Burge

Posted: Jan 27, 2025 / 03:25 PM MST

Updated: Jan 27, 2025 / 04:21 PM MST

SHARE

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — The New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) has issued a health advisory to hunters or anyone who consumed or captured wildlife between 2010 and 2024 from Holloman Lake near Alamogordo, New Mexico.

Holloman Lake, located near Alamogordo, serves as the wastewater reservoir for Holloman Air Force Base.

This follows a new environmental report revealing record-breaking levels of contamination of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) concentrations in plants and wildlife, NMDOH said."

[Those 3 lines published under fair use]

See:

Ecological Research on 

PFAS Contamination of Wildlife at

Holloman Lake

Prepared for

New Mexico Environment Department

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Prepared by

6020 Academy NE, Suite 100

Albuquerque, New Mexico 87109

www.dbstephens.com

DB23.1087

January 8, 2025