Respect, cooperation needed for cleanup
Yesterday morning I was listening to a news story on Spokane Public Radio, concerning the new committee put together by Terry Harris of Kootenai Environmental Alliance and Susan Mitchell from the Silver Valley. This new committee has been organized by them to help in the cleanup of the toxic wastes in the Lower Basin from the silver mining upstream where I live, the Upper Basin. In that interview, there was no acknowledgment from either Susan or Terry of the 25 years of invested work done by affected citizens and by the dedication of the Silver Valley Community Resource Center, which I represent. Those of us who have given a tremendous amount of our energies, time, and diligence in attending and organizing meetings with EPA officials, polluters, politicians, government agencies and tribal representatives come to the table with research, facts, statistics, etc. that would only benefit everyone that is sincerely concerned with the toxic pollutants being pushed into Lake Coeur d'Alene. These are all services that both Terry and Susan have benefited from.
In their interview, Ms. Mitchell and Mr. Harris made an inference that many citizens in the Upper Basin were angry and not willing to talk amiably at meetings regarding this issue of polluted lands and controversial repositories; that is blatantly not true. Citizens in the Silver Valley have stood by watching many family members, especially the children, suffer from the effects of toxins that have come directly from the mines in the community. This toxic poisoning has impacted numerous individuals in their ability to concentrate, to function without joint pain, to live a healthy lengthy life; these citizens have been extremely patient and consistently participated in formal and grassroots processes in waiting to receive medical help and a hope for a future without early death. Instead they are being treated as second-class citizens by most in the EPA, by state agencies charged with helping them, and now by people like Terry Harris and Susan Mitchell. Frustrations in our community only increase.
The lack of respect shown by Mr. Harris and Ms. Mitchell for the significant meetings they have attended - meetings set up, organized, and researched by the Silver Valley Community Resource Center, meetings organized with a great deal of diligence, sacrifice and hours of work by SVCRC - undermines the sincerity and success of this new committee they have now formed. A show of unity for those already in the trenches working to solve these issues of toxic waste would produce much more in the way of progress and cleanup.
The failure during this interview to mention the risk of human health exposure to all affected citizens living in the Bunker Hill/Cd'A Basin Superfund site, as well as environmental devastation caused by the Old Mission Repository, is compromising the real issues at stake. What Mr. Harris and Ms. Mitchell failed to acknowledge is that all this pollution in the Upper Basin is on its way downstream to the Lower Basin, so working together to clean the Upper Basin should be a priority. We're all at risk and our precious Lake Coeur d'Alene only continues to get more polluted while we disagree where the available funding should be directed.
Respect and cooperation can only beget, respect and cooperation essential to a Superfund cleanup and quality of life for the future.
Barb Miller is director of the Silver Valley Community Resource Center.