116 



Policy Now 



Costly Solutions 



Seeking Problems 



Almost everyone involved, including i 



the mv 

 ars ago 



Love Cor.- in New York Hundreds of people 



In response, Congress passed iwo laws 

 ihc Supcrf-jnd law of 19S0 and amendments 

 10 die Resource Conservation and Recovery 

 Act m 195^ a decide later, ihosc laws have 

 driven ihc Government 10 spend almost $2 

 billion a yea: Im the Supei fund, which cleans 

 op to/ic waste sues, and more than $8 billion 

 more a year on similar programs in othei 

 agencies, even though many of the sues pose 

 little if any danger 



"Does it make sense to spend millions of 

 dollars cleaning up a sue that only has a 

 tenth of hr, ounce of contamination?" asked 

 Dr Richard Goodwin, a private environmen- 

 tal eng.net- in Upper Saddle River. N J., who 

 has oversc-en more than 20 tostc waste clean- 

 ups. "I say no. All we're doing in most cases 

 is throwing money at a problem without 

 improving public health or the environ- 

 ment " 



Hugh B Kaufman, a hazardous waste spe- 

 cialist at :hc EPA who helped uncovcr'the 

 problem a; Love Canal, said that in the few 

 cases m which a sue is near populated areas, 

 "the bes'. thing we can do is evacuate people 

 if they want, then put up a fence and a flag 

 that says stay away " 



Mr Kaufman said he knows that his idea 

 represents a marked change in the tradition- 

 al view of how the nation should care for its 

 land But he and other experts says it does 

 not make sense to clean up these wastes at 

 costs that frequently exceed 510 million an 

 acre 



Even a principal author of the Supcrfund 

 law. Gov Jim Florio of New Jersey, who was 

 chairman of a House environmental subcom- 

 mittee in the 1970s, now argues that the 

 • "-irib'e rules mean that Superfund re- 

 sources are too often devoted to making sites ' 

 pristine.- 



"It doesn't make any sense to clean up a 

 rail yard m downtown Newark so it can be a 

 drinking water reservoir,'' he said, speaking 

 rhetorically. 



Toxic waste cleanups are one exarpple of a 

 program gone awry. Here are others: 



lEarly in the 1980's, Government scien- 

 tists argued that exposure to asbestos could 

 cause thousands of cancer deaths. Since as- 

 bestos was used as insulation in schools and 

 public buildings, parents reacted with alarm 

 So m 1985 Congress approved a sweeping law 

 that led cues and states to spend between 

 SIS billion and $20 billion to remove asbestos 

 from public buildings But three years ago. 

 the E PA completed research that prompt- 

 ed officials to admit that ripping out the 

 asbestos had been an expensive mistake; the 

 removal often sent tiny asbestos fibers into 

 the air Now. except in cases when the asbes 

 tos is damaged or crumbling, the Govern 

 ment's official advice is Don't touch it. 



<l In 1982. high concentrations of dio.xin 

 were discovered m ihc dirt roads of Times 

 Beach. Mo. near St Louis Residents were 

 alarmed, the Government had designated 

 dioxin as one of the most toxic substances 

 known The fmoi came in the middle of a 

 scandal at the EPA. the agency's chief. 

 Anne Gorsuch Burford. was accused of noi 

 enforcing environmental law and being too 

 t lose to industry And as that scandal domi 

 naiod ihc news, the Reagan Administration 

 decided to evacuate all 2.2-10 residents of 

 I imcs Ocach. a project that cost the Govern- 

 ment S37 million [lot new research indicates 

 Hut diu*in may no- be so dangerous alter all 

 None of the former residents of Times Beach 

 have been found to be harmed by dioxin, and 

 two years ago. Dr Vci non N. Houk. the 

 Federal official who uiged the evacuation, 

 dcclaied that he had made a mistake 



being spent on these problems, Washington 

 was doing little about others Here arc two 



'(■Mercury, a highly toxic metal, has con- 

 taminated thousands of lakes across the na- 

 tion, poisoning wildlife and threatening hu- j 

 man health, state environmental officials 

 say Twenty states, including New York, 

 have posted warnings at lakes urging people 

 not to eat the fish bcclusc they are tainted by 

 mercury, which can cause nervous system 

 disorders But during debate on the Clean Air 

 Act, m 1990. Congress considered limiting 

 mercury emissions from coal-burning elec- 

 tric plants The lawmakers decided not toact ' 

 because they believed utilities had already 

 been asked to spend enough to control acid 

 ram, Senate and House leaders said. 



<lln the last two years, several Federal 

 agencies nave called exposure to lead the 

 largest environmental threat to the nation's 

 children Although some scientists dispute 

 that, several studies have shown that lead 

 poisoning in children leads to reduced intelli- 

 gence, learning disabilities and hyperactivi- 

 ty The problem is that most houses built 

 before the 1970s could have some lead-based 

 paint, and the fear is that children are eating 

 paint chips or inhaling lead-laden dust Some 

 experts have said removing the lead paint ' 

 will cost at least $200 billion. This year, the ' 

 Government will spend $234 million on the 

 problem, fa*- less than it spends on cleaning 

 up toxic wastes. 



The Path to Policy 



When Politics 

 Mixes With Fear 



Even the advocates of change acknowl- 

 edge that as science evolves, experts may 

 change their views again on the dangers 

 posed by these and other substances But at 

 the least, "sound science should be our com- 

 pass.'' as Mr Rcilly put it two years ago 



After all. it was politics, misinterpreted or 

 inaccurate scientific findings and a newly 

 influential national environmental move 

 mcnl lha1 combined to set America down its 

 picscnl path 



During the 1970s, the United States had 

 successfully dealt with many obvious envi- 

 ronmental problems When the Cuyahoga 

 River in Cleveland caught lire in 1969, as an 

 example. Congress passed the Clean Water 



paigns in enlist pupulai sup|X>n for new 

 regulations They were spectacularly effec- 

 hvc at this, and Congress passed two dozen 

 hills that laid down a wgltci of mandates. 



In the 1970's, environmental statutes rare- 

 ly ran more than 30 pages In the 1980 s. these 

 hills seldom numbci cd (ewer than 500 pages 



mandate safety hunts so specific that the 

 Administration could not ignore or evade 

 them Mi Rcilly, the forma EPA chief, 

 said he wns hugely unable to change the 

 Government's thinking, despite his strong 

 opinion that environmental policy was on the 

 wrong course, because "this represented a 

 pieny significant change of direction." 

 Legitimizing Pollution? 



At the leading environmental groups, staff 

 members dispute the developing view that 

 environmental policy is off track 



"It's an effort to legitimize pollution," said 

 Daniel F. Becker, director of the Clobal 

 Warming and Energy Program at the Sierra 

 Club "There are powerful forces who have 

 an economic stake in dc-emphasizing envi 



agu " 



Out others who analyze environmental is- 

 sues said these groups are in danger of 

 becoming the green equivalent of the mili- 

 tary lobby, more interested in sowing fear 

 and protecting wasteful-programs than in 



"We are in danger of losing credibility and 

 thus losing public support if we don't modify 

 the whole way we go about protecting public 

 health an*J the environment," said Dr. Devra 

 l.ec Davxs, a senior research fellow at the 



National Research Council of the National 

 Academy of Sciences 



A Case Study 



Making Dirt 

 Safe to Eat 



Perhaps no environmental program ha; 

 come under mote criticism than the Super 

 fund and Ms progeny .The Federal program? 



. If;, 



ad.ua 



sumc more than one-quarter of the roughly 

 $38 billion that the Federal Government 

 spends fur environmental protection this 

 year lixpcrls in and out of the Government 

 assci i. though, that ihc justification for these 

 expenditures is often questionable 



Consider the case of Columbia. Miss. The 

 IS.P A is overseeing ihc last phases of n S20 

 million Supcrfund cleanup project there 

 lake many others around the country, this 

 one was guided by the Government's as- 

 sumption that children will cat dirt. Lots of it 

 And from thai dm. the Government then 

 i izctl ihiit they rould develop earn cr 



