Los Angeles residents are furious at an announcement by the Army Corps of Engineers that there will be no testing of local soil for toxins after the first six inches of topsoil are taken away during debris removal that began this week.
Residents fear that the Army Corps could leave toxins behind in the soil that could make the burned areas unsafe for years.
The Los Angeles Times reported on Thursday:
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said Wednesday that it won’t order soil testing at properties damaged by the Eaton and Palisades fires after they have been cleaned by private federal contractors — breaking with a long-standing safeguard to ensure no lingering contamination is left behind after wildfires.
…The move will likely shift the burden to homeowners, businesses and school districts to pay for testing and to potentially arrange for more contaminated soil to be removed. Under California policy, contaminated soil should be removed until wildfire-affected properties come under state limits for toxic contamination, according to wildfire experts.
…During the cleanup of the 2018 Camp fire, which destroyed the town of Paradise in Northern California’s Butte County, Pasadena-based consulting firm Tetra Tech was hired to test the soil on nearly 12,500 properties after the cleanup crews finished removing six inches of topsoil. About a third of the properties — more than 4,200 — still had toxic chemicals in excess of the state’s cleanup standards, including brain-damaging lead and cancer-causing arsenic.
The Army Corps’ Col. Eric Swenson said that the Corps could only act within the guidelines for its mission as set by the state.
After urging residents for weeks to “opt in” for the Army Corps’ debris removal, which some 96% of residents have chosen to do, locals will likely be surprised to discover that they will have to hire private contractors to finish the job.
Breitbart News learned at a press conference on Tuesday that the Army Corps debris removal, which is pitched as being “free” to residents, is actually billed later to those residents with insurance policies, via Los Angeles County.
Typically, the Army Corps may bill up to $175,000, depending on the cost of removal and the amount of insurance coverage.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
