Sierra Club report on Nashua blames Bush

By Max Heuer

WASHINGTON, Sept 26, 2002--The Sierra Club Thursday used the Mohawk Tannery site in Nashua as an example of what it says is the Bush administration's failed environmental policy.

In a report entitled "Leaving Our Communities At Risk," the environmental group pointed to a Granite State site that has been a contentious issue for the Nashua community.

The Tannery site is near the Amherst Street School, and Nashua Alderman at-large Paula Johnson says she has heard reports of children playing on the polluted grounds.

The Tannery is loaded with hazardous substances, including chromium, that, according to the Sierra Club report, can cause convulsions, kidney and liver damage and death.

The Sierra Club reports that the Environmental Protection Agency has made a proposal to clean up the site, but there is no definite time frame for cleanup and it is not on the Superfund National Priorities List. There are currently 19 Superfund sites in New Hampshire.

But the city avoided the list because, Nashua Mayor Bernard Streeter said, because Nashua is trying to obtain direct congressional appropriations to expedite a process that can take 8 to 10 years through the Superfund.

Streeter called the Sierra Club's report "obviously a political press conference to embarrass the present administration in Washington."

The Bush administration did not include a reauthorization of the Superfund "polluters pay" tax in this year's budget. The Superfund was created to clean up environmentally hazardous sites around the country.

The "polluters pay" tax required businesses that created an environmental hazard to pay for the cleanup.

While the tax has not been reauthorized since 1995, Bush's decision marks the first time a president has failed to include it in a budget proposal to Congress, shifting the financing of the Superfund to the taxpayers at large.

"We've seen over the last several years a decrease in the amount of money that goes to Superfund," Sierra Club legislative director Debbie Sease said Thursday. But more importantly, Sease said, the burden for paying for Superfund is now on taxpayers, not polluting businesses.

"In 1995, taxpayers only paid 18 percent [of the cost of the Superfund]," Sease said, adding that in fiscal 2003, the general taxpayer would pay 54 percent and by 2004 "likely will have to pick it all up."

Sease also said electing Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen to the Senate would be an important step in "pushing back" the Bush administration's policy because of Shaheen's superior record on environmental issues, adding that her policy is superior to that of her opponent, GOP Rep. John Sununu.

But Sununu said this simply wasn't true.

"The Sierra Club should spend some money hiring a new research assistant because they can't get their facts straight," Sununu said in a press release. "John Sununu is on record supporting reauthorizing the Superfund surcharges on chemical manufacturers and oil producers that expired in 1995."

Sununu added that he and Shaheen disagreed over the need to reform the program to soften its demands on small businesses.

The Shaheen campaign said Sununu's calls for reform would hurt New Hampshire.

"Governor Shaheen supports protections for New Hampshire small businesses, but she also supports making polluters clean up," said Shaheen spokesman Colin Van Ostern."Sununu's attempt to say that reforms need to be made before it's reauthorized is exactly why there are sites in New Hampshire that are not being cleaned up today, because there is no money in the Superfund."

On Tuesday, the Sierra Club announced it would be distributing information packets and sponsoring ads attacking Sununu's record on the environment.

Published in The Manchester Union Leader, in New Hampshire.