What happened here, in El Paso Texas from the years of Asarco burning illegal hazardous wastes for YEARS and YEARS SECRETLY for (in the EPA's words to the DOJ) to make money --- what happened here that was so so very bad that even today over 12 years later, the powers that be are afraid to tell the public the details of what Asarco had done?
Rep. Reyes, chair of the House Intelligence committee, said that Asarco paid millions on the condition that details of what it had done would never become public.
Despite legal notification, the Federal DOJ Asarco Bankruptcy Trustee allowed the Asarco Bankruptcy court to continue to hide those details.
Despite a NYTimes front page article and a DOJ Attorney releasing the Secret DOJ-EPA Confidential for Settlement purposes only 72 page document detailing what ASARCO had done, over five years later the Paso del Norte community has not been given the details of what contamination remains here from what ASARCO did.
Why hasn't the Trustee allowed sampling of this structure by independent community groups - or even (free!) RADON sampling inside the buildings? What on earth is the Trustee afraid of?The Asarco El Paso site Trustee writes on their website: "Dear Stakeholders, The Trust has been extremely busy working at the Former ASARCO Smelter Site to ensure a safe demolition and thorough investigation/remediation process. Current major activities include: Removing the Contop/Reverb structure to ascertain the presence of valuable matte and concentrate materials,"
The International JAC (La Paz Accord) committee passed a resolution recommending that background contamination data be gathered --- and THIS RESOLUTION WAS THEN IGNORED.
