How two different communities – one in Cape Breton –
deal with the effects of toxic waste dumps in their
backyards is the focus of a new film slated to be premiered
Friday, March 26.
Toxic Partners is a one-hour documentary comparing Fort
Valley, Georgia, with Sydney. Fort Valley’s problem is an
arsenic dump while for Sydney it’s the tar ponds and
associated sites within the .
The watershed is highly contaminated with a host of
cancer-causing chemicals left behind after nearly a century
of steel and byproduct manufacturing.
Produced by Neal Livingston, of Black River Productions
in Mabou, the film details an exchange visit arranged
between the two communities by the Sierra Club of
Canada.
“Toxic Partners tells the stories of people who have the
misfortune to be stuck living next to toxic waste sites and
the sickness and death that ensue,” said Livingston.
He said the film is a powerful documentary of how
governments cared little for the health and well being of the
residents in the communities by not taking steps to move
the people out.
The film will be shown on Vision TV March 26 at 10 p.m.
Livingston said the message he hopes will come out of
Toxic Partners is that no matter what the cost, people
should be moved away from toxic waste sites.
The Joint Action Group (JAG) is responsible in Cape
Breton to develop a clean up of the watershed. A site
assessment report has recommended that separation zones
be established around certain neighbourhoods.
Residents of Frederick Street have been the most vocal in
expressing health concerns. They are demanding to be
moved from the site until it is cleaned. JAG has set a June
1 deadline for the implementation of the separation zones.
Our VIEW
Balanced story now available
The issue:
JAG website opposed.
We suggest:
Other tellings already out there
There is still a minority opinion in the community that the solution to the Sydney tar ponds should have been to leave well enough alone. Whatever the merit in that view, and it's irrelevant now, it is true that the elaborate process on which the community is embarked raises new risks and costs, at least in the short term. Among these is the broadening public perception that Sydney, or even Cape Breton, is a dirty and unhealthy place to live.
To call this a perception is not to say there's not also truth in it. The is an environmental blight that would embarrass any urban community in North America today. In addition, a growing body of epidemiological research indicates some alarming high rates of cancer and other deadly diseases among the industrial area population for which there are few empirical explanations, but an obvious line-up of suspects: smoking, diet, the environment - not necessarity in that order.
However, while perception may contain reality, the two are not the same. One of the serious issues spawned by the very attempt to deal with the Muggah Creek problem is that perception can outstrip reality and take on a life of its own. The effort to raise public awareness of the problem and support for a cleanup also raises the risk of public alarms which will not only make the solution more difficult and expensive but may also cost the community in other ways.
Already we are seeing the transformation of the Muggah Creek problem from an environmental challenge to a public health issue, and while the difference bay be subtle the consequences are significant.
For example, the notion of environment certainly includes public health, but it also includes aesthetics. it allows one to say, without fear of public censure, that something ought to be done about the tar ponds because they are ugly, they stink and they leave a bad impression on people. It is legitimate, in other words, to worry about the tar ponds, and even to worry about the process under way to clean them up, in terms of community image -- to think about them, that is, the way the Industrial Cape Breton Board of Trade does.
Boards of trade have a knack for getting themselves on the wrong side of these controversies, for by worrying about community image they seem to be denying the problem. In fairness, though, even the most zealous proponents of the JAG process and the cleanup should acknowledge that community image is a legitimate aspect of the Muggah Creek problem -- not the leading aspect in their eyes, of course, but a legitimate one.
That having been said, however, trade board president Avvie Druker and his group were mistaken in trying to stop the launch of JAG's Internet website, or alternatively, to have a three minute video deleted fromthe site. They were wrong, in part, for the same reason that they opposed it. "Not everyone knows about this," Druker explained, "but now it's being made available around the world." Not everyone knows about it, but many do. And those outside the community know it principally throught the characteristically sensational news features that will continue to pop up from time to time on TV programs and in print. Remember the Toronto Star's catchy headline a few months back: Poison City.
Despite the impression that may be in the minds of trade board members that JAG is cult for raving environmental lunatics, the website (http://www.muggah.org/) presents a reasonably balanced and informative overview of the problem and what's being done about it. The only assertion in the video that might raise some local eyebrows is that the cleanup is underway; that's true, in fact, even though the most frequent local complaint is that JAG studies and talks while nothing is actually done to fix the problem.
The JAG website is an informative and accessible source of information on the problem. Given the alternatives, both locally and worldwide, that's hardly a reason to shut it down.
Waste Strategy gets go-ahead
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