Warning & Beseeching

The “MINUTES OF TELECONFERENCE WITH MARCO ISLAND, CONTRACTOR AND DEP AUGUST 30, 2007” contains the following statement:

“JI [Jon Iglehart] suggested pulling some groundwater samples in future areas to see what the hydrogen sulfide levels are before beginning dewatering.”

This suggestion must become a mandate.

Yes, groundwater samples must be tested for hydrogen sulfide (and any other toxin). But more than that – the results of the tests have to be extrapolated in order to calculate the release of hydrogen sulfide into the atmosphere once that groundwater is dumped onto the open. Such a measure will determine the levels by which hydrogen sulfide will diffuse into the air – which as noted in Harming Homes Environment and Health – is highly toxic to people. Even minuscule levels for just 3 minutes is very dangerous (see Important Update to Hydrogen Sulfide).

To do otherwise will once again put the public at risk from the poisonous effects of hydrogen sulfide exposure.

Since the dumping of this toxic fluid into the waterways was deemed detrimental to marine life, why will it now be dumped out into the open? Will that make the liquid less lethal? No, unless safeguards are instituted to ensure that the residents are not subjected to any harmful toxins as established by modern scientific standard.

The city’s contractors have gone from impairing human health, to contaminating the waterways and harming the marine life, and now to considering contaminating once again the air and therefore harming everybody (and everything) that breathes.

We hope that the problem is not merely being moved around again and thereby force the environmentally conscious citizens to chase the problem in virtual circles.

The city “staff” is/are on a one-dimensional track on this project (and that dimension is not our health). The state of Florida with its Labyrinthic bureaucracies collecting billions in tax revenues purportedly to protect our health and that of the environment can no longer operate under outdated and thereby mistaken misinformation as related to hydrogen sulfide and other toxins (e.g., asbestos and sulfate).

We plead to our elected officials that are personally responsible with protecting our health to stop this circuitous folly by ensuring that whatever is now going to be dumped into the open meets the highest health and safety standards in existence anywhere in the country.