Watertown Tab & Press article from April 16, 1998

I was just going through a stack of old newspapers, wondering why I saved them and also why they didn't make the the recycling bin ten years ago...page 24... article written by Christopher Rogers. Title of article, Plant plan fails at GSA site. I tried to find this on-line so I could cut & paste but no such luck, so I will type this as it's written.

 Innovative environmental cleanup deemed ineffective on Greenough Boulevard land.
                  by Christopher Rogers, Tab & Press Staff(April 16, 1998)

   Efforts to clear the former General Services Administration site of depleted uranium and other harmful contaminants have been delayed one year because a new remedy officials were hoping to implement proved ineffective.
   Officials with the Army Corps of Engineers will spend the next six months soil testing and developing a new remediation plan for the federal property at the corners of Arsenal Street and Greenough Blvd. They hope to begin remediation efforts sometime in 2000.
   Environmental engineers tested a new remediation method at the site where plants would be grown on parts of the property contaminated by depleted uranium. The plants would take up the uranium with other soil nutrients. When the uranium was soaked up from the soil, the plants would be harvested and disposed.
   Officials tested the plant remedy learned last fall, the method would not be effective on the Watertown property. Now engineers will continue testing and hope to develop a plan using traditional remediation methods of digging up and removing contaminated soil.
   "It was disappointing because this was some innovative technology and we thought we were going to save some of the traditional 'tow-it-away' remediation work,"  Army Corps of Engineer project manager Dennis Waskiewicz said.
   During World War ll and for some years afterward, the Army used the GSA site as a storage depot and staging area for low-level radioactive materials, including depleted uranium. Army personnel also burned depleted uranium chips in an open pit located at the facility.
   Efforts to remediate the contaminated soil began in the 1970s.
                                   Turning to Sawin's Pond
   Engineers are continuing to test both the GSA site and nearby Sawin's Pond. A brook runs from the pond onto the GSA site, which is a certified wetland area.
   Last fall the town took ownership of Sawin's Pond after its owner failed to pay property taxes in excess of $10,000, according to Town Treasurer Martin Walsh. The pond's fprmer owner, Maximos Hatziiliades, has until October to try and reclaim the property in land court and settle his tax bill.
   Hatziiliades did not return a phone call from the Tab & Press. However, town officials are starting to look at the pond's enviromental record and consider what may need to be done to continue cleanup efforts there.
   Sawin's Pond has been listed with the state's Department of Environmental Protection for more than 10 years. For decades, industries located around the pond had dumped waste into the pond, according to DEP records. At least two oil spills have also been recorded there. One occurred in 1983, when 1,100 gallons poured into the pond from catch basins. A leaking tank upstream at the Boston Edison building was deemed responsible, according to DEP files.
   Town Conservation Agent Thomas Brady said no cleanup efforts were planned yet for Sawin's Pond.
   "Maybe sometime. Right now we will explore what is out there," Brady said. "It has been under the [DEP's] 21E program for a long time. We will look at their files."
   The town's 1996 Open Space Plan illustrated a vision of using Sawin's Pond as a living ecological classroom if the town could ever reclaim the property.

So here we are 10 years,7 months, 13 days later and I was watching a program on local cable(Comcast #9) with Susan Falkoff being interviewed on Voices Near and Far talking about this same land still being tested. This begs the question, "Why is this taking so long to accomplish?' and 'How can concerned citizens of Watertown help get this on a faster track?' , 'Why hasn't the Federal government made this a priority cleanup since they contaminated part of our town in the first place?' ........ inquiring minds need to know!