Landfill Declared A Superfund Site
By Doug La Rocque
On April 9 both the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) appeared before the Hoosick Falls Village Board, to indicate they expected the Hoosick Falls landfill on Walnut Street, would be declared a Class 2 Superfund Site. That declaration has now come to pass. In the press release by DEC it states that, “recent environmental investigations have identified significant concentrations of PFOA and PFOS within and surrounding the landfill site.” The release further states “this has resulted in the potential for people to be exposed to site related contaminants through direct contact, ingestion of contaminated drinking water, or through the consumption of contaminated fish.” The DEC is recommending additional investigation to further define the nature and the extent of site-related contamination and to better understand the potential exposure pathways.
At the April 9 meeting DEC stated it had begun to work on remediation efforts as well as drilling test wells to see how far the contamination had spread.
Contacted by The Eastwick Press, Hoosick Falls Mayor Rob Allen says “this wasn’t a surprise, given Hoosick Falls’ industrial past, and the prevalence of locations within the area that used PFOA in their processes.”
A superfund site designation means the DEC and the EPA will now work with the potentially responsible parties, scientists, researchers, contractors as well as state, local and federal authorities to formulate cleanup plans and to decontaminate the site.