X

Green Party congressional candidate Donald Hassig planning to challenge Massena mayor about pollutants

Posted 8/21/12

MASSENA – Green Party congressional candidate Donald Hassig of Colton was to be in Massena this afternoon to challenge Mayor James Hidy to make a clear statement about persistent organic pollutants …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Green Party congressional candidate Donald Hassig planning to challenge Massena mayor about pollutants

Posted

MASSENA – Green Party congressional candidate Donald Hassig of Colton was to be in Massena this afternoon to challenge Mayor James Hidy to make a clear statement about persistent organic pollutants in fish caught in nearby waters.

Hassig has said that previous statements by Hidy in the matter were intentionally deceptive, suggesting that the fish in the area were safe to eat in large quantities.

“The mayor is quoted as having made a statement that would lead the reader to conclude that a person would have to consume a very large quantity of fish to receive an exposure to PCBs that resulted in harm to health,” Hassig said.

Hassig said the mayor knows better than that because of information he and others have presented to the mayor about the pollutants in the area around the mouth of the Grasse River in Massena that made fish from those waters likely to be carrying pollutants that made them the subject of official state limits on the amount of fish people should eat.

“The Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA) factory located just east of the Village of Massena, New York discharged waste water contaminated with PCBs and other industrial chemicals into the Grass River and the Massena Power Canal for many decades,” Hassig said. “ Heavy contamination of sediments exists downstream from the waste water outfall on the Grass and above the dam at the downstream end of the Power Canal. The US Environmental Protection Agency is currently writing a proposal for clean-up of the Grass River.”

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer and Mayor Hidy earlier this month called for a rapid decision on cleanup near ALCOA’s Massena plant to more easily alow for the company to modernize. Buy Hassig said that subsequently Hidy was quoted as making a statement “that would lead the reader to conclude that a person would have to consume a very large quantity of fish to receive an exposure to PCBs that resulted in harm to health.”

Buy Hassig points to the state Department of Health advisory on sport fish consumption that advises girls and women of child-bearing age to consume no sport fish from the waters of the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario.

“The fish in the Grass River downstream from ALCOA wastewater discharge points and the fish in the part of the St. Lawrence River bordering St. Lawrence County downstream from the mouth of the Grass are contaminated with PCBs at a higher level than what is average for the fish of the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario,” Hassig said.

“Additionally, the fish of the Grass and the downstream section of the St. Lawrence bordering St. Lawrence County are contaminated with average levels of dioxins and other persistent organic pollutants (POPs). Considering the DOH advisory for consumption of fish contaminated at this average level, it is clear that consumption of a single fish caught from the Grass River in the section impacted by ALCOA PCB discharges would impose an unacceptable quantity of disease risk.”

Hassig said he would speak at today’s Massena Village Board meeting to give a five-minute presentation on the matter.