Published: April 28, 2007 12:31 am

Berea CWWG is plaintiff in federal lawsuit

By Ronica Shannon
Register News Writer

Berea's Chemical Weapons Working Group (CWWG) is yet again listed as one of the organizations and representatives suing the U.S. Army and the U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency.

A notice of intent to sue was sent Friday to several state and federal representatives and a few of those addressed include: President George W. Bush; Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales; Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates; Secretary of the Army Pete Geren; and Dale Ormond, acting director for the U.S. Army Chemical Materials Agency.

The suit is associated with the shipment of VX nerve agent waste from a disposal site in Newport, Ind., to an incinerator in Port Arthur, Texas, to be burned.

Attorney Mick Harrison of Bloomington, Ind., is representing the plaintiffs and said his clients wish to stop the shipments as soon as possible and that under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, "It is appropriate to grant preliminary injunctive relief as a precautionary and preventive measure."

The CWWG has been plaintiffs in similar past lawsuits, including one against the Army addressing its attempts to ship VX nerve agent waste from a chemical stockpile in Newport, Ind., to commercial waste facilities in Ohio and New Jersey.

Other plaintiffs in the current suit include: The Sierra Club, Citizens Against Incineration at Newport, Community In-Power Development Association, Indiana residents Sara Morgan and Leonard Akers and Texas residents Hilton Kelley and Moya Green.

"We (the CWWG) believe that it was our responsibility as reasonable people to bring some of these allegations to the attention of the appropriate authorities," CWWG Director Craig Williams said Friday during a teleconference with all parties involved in the lawsuit's filing.

Plaintiffs are claiming that shipment of the chemical waste from Indiana to Texas is a violation of the federal Solid Waste Disposal Act, the Resource, Conservation and Recovery Act and the Indiana Environmental Protection Act.

The reason for filing the lawsuit is out of concern for the possibility of substantial danger to public health and the environment.

Information received by CWWG from confidential sources indicates that the VX waste will have detectable levels of both agent VX itself and the highly toxic waste byproduct "EA2192," and that the waste containers have a history of leaking.

The Army's "Finding of No Significant Impact" and the Environmental Assessment were based on the assumption that the chemical waste would not contain any detectable amounts of agent VX, according of the Notice of Intent to Sue document.

Federal, Indiana and other states' hazardous waste laws and regulations require that hazardous waste be adequately tested and the chemical contents determined prior to shipment or disposal.

According to law, if the facility owner or operator receives new information, or if they find based on an inspection, or if they have other reason to believe that the character of the waste has changed from the original analysis, then a new waste analysis must be performed, according to information provided in the letter.

"Methods being used by the Army and their contractor is what we consider to be a deceptive practice and they are executing this program with misinformation and secrecy," Williams said.

Hilton Kelley, a 47-year-old resident of Port Arthur, Texas, and a veteran of the United States Navy, said for years his community has been exposed to toxic waste and pollution from local refineries and chemical plants.

He and other community members are concerned about dangers of toxic air that they breathe which could cause asthma and other respiratory diseases, as well as liver and kidney diseases.

Many of the residents suffer from hypertension. He and other community members think there is a direct correlation between those illnesses.

Moya Green, who moved to Port Arthur, Texas, in the summer of 1989, is 35 years old and has asthma. Both her son, 16, and daughter, 14, have asthma and irregular liver enzyme levels.

Sara Morgan has been a resident of Parke County, Ind., for 32 years. Her home is about three miles away from and directly east of the Newport Chemical Activity, which is presently destroying the nerve agent VX by a process of neutralization. Morgan’Äôs main water source is the Wabash River.

"This is the source from which I and my family get our drinking water," she included in the notice of intent. "If a truck were to catch fire and explode in an accident, the nerve agent contained in the waste would be airborne and dispersed for miles around. VX disperses very rapidly when heated."

Harrison said he expects to file the suit against shipment on Monday in Indiana and hopes to have a hearing as quickly thereafter as possible. 

"It depends on the court's schedule," he said. "But, I would expect the court to recognize the serious nature of our petition and hear it expeditiously."

Ronica Shannon can be reached at rshannon@richmondregister.com or 623-1669, Ext. 234.