Posts belonging to Category MASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Candace Head-Dylla, Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance, 505-401-4349

Nadine Padilla, Multicultural Alliance for a Safe Environment, 505-240-3104

MILAN, NM RESIDENTS PUT HOME UP FOR SALE DUE TO HOMESTAKE/ BARRICK GOLD RADON CONTAMINATION  

*Video available at: http://bit.ly/NMUranium

Milan, N.M. — Just a half mile north of the nearest homes in Milan, NM sits the Homestake/ Barrick Gold Uranium Tailings Pile Superfund Site.  This site holds the 22 million tons of radioactive waste (uranium mill tailings) generated during the last uranium boom in this area. The Tailings Pile sits unlined and sparcely covered, releasing contaminants into the air and water.  State and federal agencies struggle to find a remediation strategy that can maintain the contamination leaking from the site.

The Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance is a grassroots community group formed to address the ongoing contamination from the Homestake/Barrick Gold Uranium Tailings Pile.  For over 50 years, the site has leaked radioactive contaminants including radon into the air and into their water systems, making water wells unusable by the local community.

Community members living around the Tailings Site experience greater health problems than those living in surrounding areas.  Health problems include various cancers, asthma, severe migraines, gallbladder diseases, and thyroid diseases – to name a few. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, exposure to radon causes lung cancer in non-smoker and smokers alike.

Annual air monitoring reports conducted by the US EPA in 2006 – 2010 indicate releases of radon outside the area covered by the Nuclear Regulartory Commission license, in concentrations exceeding US EPA standards. The 2006 – 2010 annual air monitoring report indicates that releases of radon exceeded the annual average concentrations allowed under 40 CFR 192.02(b)(2).

Radon air monitors along the Homestake fenceline have continuously recorded outdoor ambient air radon concentrations associated with cancer risk levels that are greater than EPA’s acceptable cancer risk range of 1 x 10-4 to 1 x 10-6 [i.e., lifetime cancer risks of 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 1 million], as published in the National Contingency Plan.

Community members and Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance President, Candace Dylla and her husband, are putting the home they built up for sale, because of the high radon levels and the radioactive contaminants in their water wells. Candace Dylla says, “We’re putting our home up for sale, because it is no longer safe for us to live here.  It’s unacceptable and dangerous for our families.” Over the past few decades, property values of the area have fallen due to past lawsuits with Homestake/Barrick Gold and local knowledee of the contamination. The fallen property values have left working families’ investments in land and housing worthless.

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The Multicultural Alliance for a Safe Environment (MASE) is rooted in the experiences of uranium-impacted communities of the southwestern U.S. We are communities working to restore and protect the natural and cultural environment through respectfully promoting intercultural engagement among communities and institutions for the benefit of all life and future generations.

MASE Core Group of Alliances

Bluewater Valley Downstream Alliance, Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining, Laguna-Acoma Coalition for a Safe Environment,  Post-71 Uranium Workers Committee, Red Water Pond Road Community Association

MASE Affiliated Groups and Allies

Amigos Bravos, Moquino Mutual Domestic Water Consumers Association, New Mexico Environmental Justice Working Group, McKinley Community Health Alliance, New Mexico Environmental Law Center, Office of Peace, Justice and Creation Stewardship, Partnership for Earth Spirituality, Ramah Navajo Community, Dineh Bidziil, Sierra Club Environmental Justice Office, Southwest Research and Information Center, Stewards of Creation, NukeWatch, Think Outside the Bomb, Western Mining Action Network, Wise Uranium

www.masecoalition.org

YOU ARE INVITED TO A U.S. EPA REGION 6 COMMUNITY MEETING FOR THE HOMESTAKE MINING COMPANY SITE/GRANTS MINING DISTRICT

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 6 invites you to a community meeting regarding the on-going remedial actions at the Homestake Mining Company Superfund Site. All interested parties are invited to attend.

EPA will give an:

*update about the risk assessment sampling;

*update about the five-year review; and

*update about the Grants Mining District FiveYear Plan.

This meeting is being held in a fully accessible facility.

Should you have specific needs or questions about the meeting facility, please contact Stephen Harper, U.S. EPA Community Involvement Coordinator/SEE, at 1.800.533.3508 (toll free).

DATE:  Thursday, March 8, 2012

TIME:   6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

LOCATION:  Cibola County Building

515 High Street

Grants, NM 87020

Invitation to Homestake/Grants Mining District Community Meeting – March 8, 2012

As the Jackpile generation of miners passes, it is easy to forget the health dangers and corporate politics of energy production in this country. If you want to become informed about all aspects of uranium mining, nuclear power/war and its legacy then come watch some of these great films featuring New Mexican activists, scientists, and community members. Members from the Southwest Research Information Center (SRIC), Multicultural Alliance for a Safe Environment (MASE), and a few of our film’s producers and directors will participate in panel discussions after the screenings.

Gallup and Church Rock, N.M. —The public is invited to two important events Saturday, July 16 to learn more about New Mexico’s unique position in the nuclear fuel cycle and acknowledge some of the painful history.  July 16 is significant for many reasons including the fact that the nuclear age was ushered in with the world’s first atomic detonation at Trinity Site on July 16, 1945.

The first event, the “Uranium Legacy Remembrance Day” takes place outside of Church Rock at the largest radioactive spill site in U.S. history. “Making Waves,” the second event, will be held in the Calvin Hall on the Gallup campus of the University of New Mexico.

“In response to many things including the Las Conchas fire burning on and around the Los Alamos National Laboratory now, the 66th anniversary of the Trinity Site, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in March and the 32nd anniversary of the Church Rock disaster (which also occurred on July 16), our community is organizing these two important events,” says Nadine Padilla, Multicultural Alliance for a Safe Environment (MASE). “The dangers of all things nuclear are forefront on minds worldwide. I’d like to thank Leona Morgan, Mike Butler, Teddy Nez, Robert Tohe and everyone involved for organizing these events. I hope the public can join us to learn more about these critical issues and help us find ways to protect our land and people from toxic uranium mining.”

URANIUM REMEMBRANCE DAY
Thirty two years ago onJuly 16, 1979 United Nuclear Corporation’s dam broke,in what is now known as the Church Rock disaster. More than 93 million gallons of liquid toxic waste were released into the Puerco River in Church Rock, N .M. Thousands of residents live with the lasting effects from this radioactive spill to this day. Teddy Nez and the Red Water Pond RoadAssociation have been working on remediation and healing from this catastrophe since that time.

In light of the renewed interest of uranium mining, the fires around Los Alamos and the recent disaster in Japan, the organizers felt it is especially important to host the event this year. The health effects of past mining and the Church Rock disaster will be remembered for many generations and is something the community is dealing with to this day. There has been no uranium waste clean-up in the past 40 years which impacts all of the areas around the spill including the Coyote Canyon, Standing Rock, Nahodishgish, Pinedale and Church Rock Chapters of the Navajo Nation.

Uranium Remembrance Day will start at 7 a.m. with a prayer at Teddy Nez’s home on Red Water Pond Road. People will then march to the site of the spill. Numerous elected officials and community leaders including Senator Lovejoy, Representative Ben Ray Luján and Clancy Tenley from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be speaking about the health and environmental effects of the uranium. The first commemorative march took place in 2009 on the 30th Anniversary of the spill. That event ended with a proclamation signing by the President of the Navajo Nation Joe Shirley reinstating the 2005 Diné Natural Resources Protection Act which bans uranium processing on the Navajo Nation.

MAKING WAVES
“Making Waves,” takes place Saturday, July 16, 5-7 p.m. at Calvin Hall on the UNM Gallup campus and will address t he full nuclear fuel cycle and the resulting radioactive contamination. The event is hosted by community leaders and residents from New Mexico and Arizona living near nuclear activities.

“We are organizing this event to educate the public about the dangers of uranium mining and nuclear industry in the Southwest,” says Leona Morgan, co-organizer of the event and the Eastern Navajo Diné Against Uranium Mining Coordinator. “New Mexico holds an important and unique place in the nuclear fuel cycle. Unfortunately the nuclear industry has wreaked havoc on Southwestern communities; from weapons development and storage to uranium mining, milling,enrichment and disposal for more than 60 years. There are hundreds of families in New Mexico who have suffered health and environmental effects from the nuclear cycle and nuclear proliferation.”

New Mexico is home to Los Alamos National Labs, Sandia National Labs, Uranium Enrichment Plant (URENCO), Kirtland Air Force Base (AFB), Holloman AFB, Cannon AFB, the Trinity Site, and the Waste Isolation Pilot Project. In addition, there are numerous active and abandoned uranium mines and mills in all Four Corners states; New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Utah.

“Making Waves” will include screenings of short films and a panel discussion. Panelists include Robert Tohe from the Sierra Club’s Environmental Justice (EJ) office and Laura Watchempino from the Pueblo of Acoma. Tohe’s department works with tribes and community groups to protect their resources from contamination. Watchempino has worked for her tribe protecting and managing tribal water resources. She served as attorney for Indian Pueblo Legal Services in New Mexico in the 1980s and is currently working on the designation of nuclear free zones to combat the proliferation of the nuclear fuel cycle, from uranium mining and processing to the long-term disposal of the toxic radioactive wastes generated. Watchempino states that every part of the cycle poses dangers to the surrounding water, air, soil, human health and other life forms.

Organizers of these events are currently addressing requests for permits for uranium mining in and around the Grants mineral belt and stand united that they should not be granted in the aftermath of the health and environmental devastation in New Mexico. These groups are committed to see the United States transition from dirty and unsafe energy sources into renewable energy and embrace a clean and safe future.

These events are organized by members of the Multicultural Alliance for a Safe Environment. www.masecoalition.org

WHAT: Uranium Remembrance Day
WHERE: 29E Red Water Pond Road, (.5 miles west off end of. Rt. 566, 11.5 miles north of Church Rock)
WHEN: 7 a.m. Prayer; 8-10 a.m. March to site; 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. Program
INFO: Teddy Nez, 505-879-2910, tntnez@yahoo.com

WHAT: Making Waves
WHERE: Calvin Hall, University of New Mexico – Gallup 705 Gurley Ave. Gallup, NM 87301
WHEN: Saturday, July 16, 2011, 5-7 p.m.
INFO: Leona Morgan, 505-879-8547, leona.morgan@yahoo.com

INTERVIEWS AND IMAGES ARE AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST

CONTACT:
Jennifer Marshall, 505-231-1776
jennifer@jmarshallplan.com
www.jmarshallplan.com

You’re invited to learn more about the current uranium projects going on in the Four Corners area and to discover what you can do to protect our land, our water, our air, and our people.

The Making Waves event will feature two short films on environmental justice struggles in Japan and the Southwest, followed by a panel discussion with speakers from areas affected by the nuclear fuel chain.

see attached flier for more information

When: Saturday, July 16th
Where: Red Water Pond Road Community
0.5 miles West of the end of State Road 566, 11.5 miles North of rock
What: March from Red Water Pond Road to the site of the 1979 Uranium Tailings Spill 7-10 AM
Statements from elected officials and community groups and luncheon 10 AM
Screenings of short environmental justice films, followed by panel discussion Calvin Hall, UNM Gallup 5-7 PM

MAKING_WAVES_July16