Well, perhaps soon my wife's pictures of the slime in the Gowanus canal (we beat the NY Times to it by more than a year) may become a thing of the past. Today the United States Environmental Protection Agency finally designated the Gowanus Canal as a Superfund site, designated for cleanup. I think we can all greet this with relief, with the exception of developers who wanted to develop the site with stink and slime intact for reasons which I cannot understand unless their greed has just decayed their common sense. I can only imagine real estate agents trying to move luxury apartments as that Gowanus stink wafted on the breeze.

But now a real cleanup is in the works thanks to Obama's EPA. Here is the Press release from State Senator Velmanette Montgomery, an early supporter (along with the Army Corps of Engineers and the Columbia University’s Urban Design Lab) of Superfund designation as the best way to clean up the canal:

Senator Velmanette Montgomery on EPA Superfunding the Gowanus Canal:
THANK YOU!  read more »

As Joy, Jacob and I strolled along Union Street, we noticed that even in the middle of winter (Feb. 20, 2010) the Gowanus Canal stank. And when we neared it, this is what we saw.

Photos by Joy Romanski

View from Union St. Bridge over the Gowanus:

Closeup 1:

Closeup 2:

 read more »

This week was the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster. And, 25 years later, the disaster continues.

On Dec. 2nd and 3rd, 1984, the criminal negligence killed some 20,000 people and left over 100,000 affected. And corporate America, responsible for this disaster, has done almost nothing to clean up the mess and take responsibility in the past 25 years.

From an article on BBC News this last week:

In Bhopal no-one uses the term "accident" to describe the calamity that took place here in the early hours of 3 December 1984.

For "accident" implies blamelessness. And in Bhopal the hunger for justice among those who suffered seems undiminished.

Those who survived remember the terrible randomness of it.

Eyewitnesses saw a dense cloud of poisonous gas settle on the slum areas that crowded the Union Carbide pesticide plant...

The Chingari Rehabilitation Centre is a small charitable organisation - a drop-in day centre for children born with severe disabilities, whose parents were exposed to the gas.

"These are the second generation affected," says Tarun Thomas, who runs Chingari.  read more »

The movement to cleanup the Gowanus Canal before allowing development is growing. Here is a coalition that is forming to push for Superfund status for the Gowanus canal so it can be effectively cleaned up:

* United States Environmental Protection Agency
* New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
* The Army Corps of Engineers
* Riverkeeper
* The Sierra Club
* Columbia University’s Urban Design Lab
* Friends of Greater Gowanus (FROGG)
* Carroll Gardens Coalition for Respectful Development (CG CORD)
* Friends of Bond
* Park Slope Neighbors
* The Central Brooklyn Independent Democrats
* New York State Senator Velmanette Montgomery

This, to me, is a great coalition of local, state and national organizations. And I should note that "Friends of Bond" refers to Bond St., not a British secret agent who likes his drinks shaken, not stirred.

You can join the movement as well through Superfund Gowanus:  read more »

Recently I discussed the split between people who want to develop the Gowanus Canal right now despite massive pollution, and those who agree with Obama's EPA in wanting the Gowanus declared a Superfund site so it can be completely cleaned up before being developed. Given that the Gowanus Canal is the second most polluted site in the state, many feel that cleaning it up before developing would be the only sane way to approach it.

Previously City Council candidate Josh Skaller has been one of the few people leading the drive to work with Obama's EPA to clean up the canal. You can read Josh's statement here. Today State Senator Velmanette Montgomery joined Josh Skaller in supporting the EPA's plan to designate the canal a Superfund site: (from her Press Release)  read more »