Susan Falkoff's blog

Last week, it looked like the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) was prepared to sign off that the “GSA property” along Greenough Boulevard (a former part of the Watertown Arsenal that will revert to state ownership) was sufficiently “clean” of toxic waste to safely transfer it from the federal government to the state. DCR was apparently prepared to sign even before seeing the results of recent sampling done by their own contractors (funded by a grant that Rep Kaprielian put into the state budget). It is rumored that the new testing shows evidence of serious contamination that the Army did not address. Watertown Citizens for Environmental Safety (WCES) got wind of this -- and we couldn’t get anyone in DCR to return our calls. Exasperated, we contacted Sen. Tolman’s office. His staff responded quickly and appropriately to gather information and call the right people. As a result, DCR’s attorneys are reviewing the situation and the document will not be signed until the new sampling is reviewed. Thank you, Senator Tolman.

DCR’s indifference to this property is baffling. Back in January 2006, (then) DCR Commissioner Steve Burrington wrote a letter to the Army Corps of Engineers saying that DCR would not accept transfer of the GSA site unless it was cleaned of to a standard that would render it fit for any reuse scenario and cleared of the dangerous, crumbling, asbestos-contaminated buildings that blight it.

Since then, members of WCES have been trying persistently -- but without any success whatsoever -- to see how DCR proposed to operationalize this goal. The buildings are still there, still crumbling. Questions remain unanswered about the cleanup. Why won’t DCR return our calls? The situation is, if anything worse under the Deval Patrick administration than it had been under Romney. In fact, former Commissioner Burrington was a well-known environmentalist and his firing was bewildering. We have lost an ally and we are not persuaded that the new Commissioner comprehends the importance of safe and accessible urban recreational spaces.

Thank goodness for Rep Kaprielian and Sen. Tolman

This afternoon, the Town Council's Ad Hoc Committee on the Recycle Center held an interesting open air meeting in Filipelo Park. I attended, along with most of the Council members, Conservation Commission members and several town department heads. Jennifer Soper from the MA Executive Office of Environmental Affairs came to clarify state and federal limitations on the use of the park. She made it clear that, in her opinion and in the opinion of the National Park Service, Filipelo park is protected and the Recycle Center is within its boundaries. She outlined some possible things the town could do to keep the recycle center in the park, such as exploring the feasibility of a tiny curb cut on Grove Street and a tiny recycle center, or finding equivalent property to exchange. The parties took their usual stands: Councilor Devaney wants to figure out how to go around the park's status and keep the Recycle Center at Filipelo Park; Marylouise Pallotta McDermott and the Conservation Commission want to preserve the park in its entirety. A lot of other people would just like to see the matter settled. This is something that will not happen quickly -- maybe not in my lifetime --if the town goes the route of changing the park's legal status.

Personally, I've been saying for a long time that the win-win solution is for the town to find another property. But Town Manager Mike Driscoll has never wavered from his position that the best location for a Recycle Center is where it is. Today, he made an impasioned (for him) concluding speech about how, "We need to work together on this." There was no way to interpret his remarks other than, "We need to keep the Recycle Center at the park, so back off, Marylouise McDermott." So who isn't willing to work together on a mutually satisfactory solution? I hate it when someone won't budge an inch and then accuses everyone who disagrees with him/her of being a spoiler. I was disgusted!