County and Metro Detroit officials blast the EPA’s decision to send the waste from that toxic train derailment in Ohio to Michigan.
Those deliveries have now been put on hold, but officials want to know why the decision was made in the first place.
The facilities were built explicitly for waste, as the one spilled at the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.
Shawn Ley: “I am told there is a temporary hold. What does temporary mean?”
Wayne County Commissioner Ray Basham: “Good question and I wish I had the answer.”
Basham took Local 4 and Huron Township Supervisor David Glaab to the spot where shipments of contaminated liquid from the derailment disaster to where they ended up at Republic Services in Romulus at I-94 and Instker Road.
The location is where Michigan’s first and only deep injection well was, which means toxic liquids were injected down past the groundwater into the rock below to store and get rid of it.
“It don’t just stay there,” Basham said. “It is porous sandstone,” Basham said. “Not only is it in Romulus. It goes over to Taylor, to Westland. Who knows where it goes?”
There is a hold now on any more shipments that sent the first round of contaminated liquid the EPA did.
When Metro Detroit leaders started demanding answers, text messages between Wayne County officials indicate the EPA never told anyone the waste from Ohio was headed to Michigan.
Read: Michigan officials ‘blindsided’ by arrival of waste from Ohio train derailment
Officials want answers as to why toxic waste from train derailment was sent to Michigan
One text Local 4 obtained said:
“They admittedly dropped the ball on communicating this to us in a timely manner.”
Glaab says leaders must keep an eye on the EPA.
Glaab: “Making sure EPA and three-digit agencies are playing by the rules.
Ley: “Are they?”
Glaab: “We don’t know yet. It is too premature. (But) we certainly don’t want East Palestine’s problems to be Michigan’s problem.”
Glaab says trucking the hazardous liquid past storage sites in Ohio just increases the chances of another emergency if one of those trucks crashes.
More: Wayne County leaders don’t want any more toxic waste imported from Ohio train derailment
