"Get on with it" view not the only one

Letter to the editor from Debbie Ouellette
Cape Breton Post
Wed., Jan. 19, 2005

A few members of the Sydney and Area Chamber of Commerce have been in the news lately, claiming to speak on behalf this community. They have no right to think they are speaking for me or others who do not have the same views as they do concerning the cleanup of the tar ponds and the coke ovens site.

I would like a list of the names of the experts who are giving out information to some members of this group. We have no idea who these experts are.

What part of the community does the chamber think it is speaking for? Some 3,000 people from this community signed a petition calling for a full-panel review of the cleanup plan. Only 1,754 people filled out booklets in the Joint Action Group process, which in the end did not favour burial or incineration as cleanup options.

Look at all the money wasted over the last 20 years. The concerns of the people in the cleanup mean nothing because governments think they have the last say.

When the chamber says the community wants to get on with the cleanup, "get on with it" means the health and safety of this community mean nothing.

If we do not speak up as one, a portable PCB-burning incinerator will be placed somewhere within the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, which I believe will contaminate someone's backyard with toxic chemicals such as dioxins and furans. How many residents want this in their backyard?

I heard of only one person who got on the radio phone-in show Talkback to say he would have no problem with a PCB incinerator in his backyard, and that was Parker Donham of the Sydney Tar Ponds Agency. If he thinks it is so safe, then that's where the incinerator should go.

Debbie Ouellette
Sydney