GOP AND EPA BOYCOTT SENATE SLUDGE HEARING
9/8/08
Hi folks.
I will be sending you a press release about the Senate Oversight Hearing on sludge, meanwhile, here are some details.
The EPW Sludge Hearing is now an Oversight Briefing. The format has been changed. Republicans and EPA are
boycotting it, making a full hearing difficult to have. EPA is refusing to send anyone to speak. As you can
imagine, there has been tremendous pressure from industry and its trade groups.
We remain upbeat about this, as it is an opportunity to educate the public and get the ball rolling on legislation.
This briefing is open to the public and the media.
Witnesses are:
Andy McElmurray
Ellen Harrison
David Lewis
A sewer District manager from Utah (industry rep)
We have over 100 pages of victim testimony, and testimony from others concerned about sludge dumping, to submit
for the record (and keep them coming up until and also after the hearing). Thanks to all who wrote something and
submitted it on Sludge News.
EPW is calling the Briefing: "Oversight on the State of the Science and Issues Associated with the EPA's Sewage
Sludge Program"
It will start at 10:30 AM, September 11.
We are having a press conference at 9:30 AM in an adjacent room.
It is important that people who are concerned about sludge spreading come to DC. You will not be allowed to testify, but
we will try to make you available to the press.
We are meeting outside the hearing room, 406 Dirksen Senate Office Building, at 9:00 AM.
The Dirksen Senate Office Building is located northeast of the Capitol on a site bounded by Constitution Avenue, C
Street, First Street, and Second Street N.E., it adjoins the later Hart Senate Office Building.
You can find a map, here: http://www.aoc.gov/cc/cc_map.cfm
Parking at Union Station is likely easiest. The building is a short walk from the station.
Anyone lost or with questions can reach me at 617-413-8505 (cell).
Best regards,
Laura
Bakersfield.com Article: Group seeks community input for national sludge fight
http://www.bakersfield.com/102/story/546645.html
Group seeks community input for national sludge fight
BY STACEY SHEPARD, Californian staff writer
sshepard@bakersfield.com | Monday, Sep 8 2008 6:40 PM
A group calling for a federal moratorium on land applying sewage sludge is collecting stories from people affected by
sludge in their community.
Tell federal lawmakers how you've been impacted by sludge by completing a form (http://www.sludgenews.org/action/)
or faxing your story to 617-522-0690.
The stories will be submitted to the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, chaired by Sen. Barbara
Boxer, during an oversight briefing on sludge Thursday.
"We want the committee to hear stories directly from people who are being adversely impacted by land application,"
said Laura Orlando, a professor at Boston University School of Public Health and executive director of the ReSource
Institute for Low Entropy Systems, a nonprofit organization that works on sanitation and water quality issues.
"We want to get the story out there that people around the country are suffering from this practice of disposing sewage
sludge on land."
Orlando's group wants Congress to declare an immediate moratorium on the land application of sludge while there's
more scientific study of it. They say new science shows spreading sludge on farmland is not the safe practice federal
regulators say it is.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency has promoted the land application of sludge since ocean dumping was
outlawed in 1987.
When that happened, Kern County became the destination for thousands of tons of sludge from around the state,
including almost all of the sludge from the city of Los Angeles. Southland sanitation officials insist the practice doesn't
do harm.
For years, Kern County leaders and residents have battled with Los Angeles and other Southland agencies over the
sludge. The county imposed stricter treatment standards and, in 2006, voters banned its spreading on farmland by
overwhelmingly approving Measure E.
But a Los Angeles judge overturned the ban in 2007; Kern is appealing.
After several national news stories about the safety of sludge broke earlier this year, Boxer called for the Senate
committee hearing by the end of summer.
Committee officials said Monday that Boxer and other committee members had decided in recent days to hold a
scaled-down briefing instead of a hearing, though they declined to say why.
The briefing will feature testimony from an EPA whistleblower, a Georgia farmer whose land was polluted and animals
died from sludge spread on his land, a retired Cornell University scientist and a sewer district manager from Utah.
EPA officials declined to testify, committee officials said.