This is why I love East Chicago (cell phone photos).

Click on image to begin slideshow.

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series

25-years-ago BP abandoned its professional training facilities in Robertsdale, donating the facilities to Calumet College, and moved to a 200-acre LEED certified campus in Naperville. They did so because they could no longer attract professionals to this location due to Quality of Life issues. Quality of Life issues they had a major hand in creating.

Today BP’s professional staff enjoy the healthy work environment of a green campus with ample buffering between office buildings and roadways, while residents adjacent to the BP’s refinery are not so fortunate. Today BP is constructing a whole new facility at their East Chicago / Whiting Refinery to refine the “No Good, Very Bad, Dirty” heavy sour crude from the Alberta Tars Sands and to do so they are constructing 6 cokers directly across the street from the Marktown Historic District where more than 120 children under the age of 18 live, play and sleep.

BP likes to refer to the project as a modernization or retooling project. This is an important distinction to them because to call it what is, a “new facility” or “new construction,” would trigger all sorts of regulatory reviews and permitting, including a new-source review requiring an environmental and health risk assessment. I am not certain if there has ever been a risk assessment done on the impacts the BP refinery has the neighboring communities. I don’t know if that is because they have been grandfathered in or what. I just know that new construction ought to trigger a new source review and that is not happening.

For labor purposes BP calls the project a “maintenance project.” Thus they bypass all sorts of labor rules in terms of pay, scheduling, and work conditions as would be the case for new construction. Let’s make this simple, if I tore down my house to construct a brand new home, I could not go to City Hall seeking a maintenance permit for the new construction. I would be required to seek the proper permits and follow requirements for new construction. This is just one way in which BP has been cutting corners here to save themselves costs. I can’t say what other cost cutting measures BP is making, but I do know they did not do this without the aid of regional leadership. I wonder what our regional leadership is thinking now as we learn more about the costs of BP practices to the gulf region.

This is a good environmental justice example of how benefits-without-risks are created and separated from risks-without-benefits in a free-market economy. Free-market corporations and present day land use policies have a very intentional consequent of accumulating wealth and benefits in one location while clustering risks and blight in another. All too often the geography of separation is as clear as the “Northshore” and “Southshore” designations.

It makes me wonder if anyone working in office complexes similar to the BP complex in Naperville feel any sense of culpability for the lives negatively impacted on the other side of their company’s production line. What about Kraft Foods? what about Grainger? what about Cargill? and U.S. Steel? and ArcelorMittal? Boeing? GATX? or Ryerson?

[ Wikipedia list of Corp HQ in the Chicago Met area ]

Compounding problems, BP extracted an additional $165 million in tax abatements from the mostly poor people of Marktown and East Chicago. They did this behind closed doors, and without a single public hearing, all while lecturing the region on “Good Government.” Despite efforts, residents, who pay the highest property taxes in the state at 7.4%, still do not know that they gave up $165 million to BP. BP accomplished this feat by spreading the wealth to voting districts outside the plume of negative externalities while taking advantage of their partnerships with corrupt local political enterprises under the plume. BP is well known for this form of philanthropic activity and I could go on about “to whom” and “how much” was given, but that will have to be for another post. Let these two examples suffice for now.

Three years ago a $25-million donation from BP capped Phase 1 of a three-part expansion and renovation campaign. Since 2002, BP had agreed to more than $125 million in state and regional legal settlements over pollution problems.

Art museums are often the beneficiaries of largess from corporations wishing to polish their sometimes less-than-gleaming image. (Cigarette, anyone?) Oops.

via [ LA Times ] BP Grand Entrance at LACMA looking not-quite-so-grand

In 2009 BP gave to Napperville for $1 an extremely expensive Hydrogen fueling station with multipliers of positive effects.

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series, Energy, Environment

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present to you and to the World, the Local Governing body serving host to the most contaminated region on the Great Lakes, the East Chicago Common Council. This “Area of Concern” (AOC) is home to BP (the largest In-land Oil refinery), and ArcelorMittal (the largest integrated steelmill).

“Re-Circumventing the Wheel” was probably the most understated quote to come out of the council meeting last night. Someone asked if it was greek or just the result of overexposure to industrial toxins. Only the future will tell if it was dyslexia, brilliance or prophecy that spoke this night. Being known for my own afflictions, I don’t disparage from whence culture springs.

East Chicago politics can be great theater, but in this greek tragedy who is who is never apparent - and that goes for the identity of the audience as well. Heck, I’ve seen all sort of people attracted to this show. The best hands dealt in this play are generally the invisible hands.

In light of a recent federal indictment of the Mayor, the council has put on its training wheels and is attempting to do something it has never done, nor is it prepared to do - city business.

With hoots and hollers the “Good Guys” in this chamber had the audience enthralled. The political theater taking place on this stage is only a lagging indicator of the decades of highly capitalized turmoil and degradation. As this community has learned there is certainly enough culpability to go around. Money always finds a taker.

From my position in the audience last evening, there were none of the virtuous thumping of chests we witnessed 5-years ago during the “Copeland (CIA), Pabey, and Medina era of reform.” HOPE-fully that era has passed. This council was much more sedate. They were practically as afraid of the roles they were forced to take, as they were unprepared to take them. Still, they are heroes in our hearts for trying. Every attempt at righteous indignation and bandstanding awakened awkward and painful attention.

The gilded performer at the center of this stage was Attorney Joseph Allegretti - the former attorney of the Common Council, who returned this week, among gasps, representing the indicted Mayor. His performance was an astonishing unselfish offering of truth and guidance. In uncharacteristic thuggish fashion and stature, he was a Man prepared to play a role - Oh, how I envy playing the bad guy. And when our supporting characters on the council stage lost focus, it was the legendary Allegretti who brought them back on script.

This community brought to you by

The “Good Government” people at the bottom of the American Promise

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series, Local

Sometimes it takes a disaster like the Earth Day Disaster to realize our hometowns and our future have been colonized.

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series, Economics, Energy, Environment, Infrastructure, Politics

Today Manuel Mendoza, my wife’s past student, visited us with wonderful news. He just received a phone call from Harvard and told he was accepted. In his excitement he felt he had to tell his sixth-grade teacher first - Kristin. Kristin was in tears with pride. What a day…

Congratulations Manuel! Congratulation Kristin!

From the [ NWI Times ] E.C. Student Headed to Harvard By Steve Zabroski

EAST CHICAGO | An East Chicago Central High School senior will be heading to Harvard University in the fall.

Manuel Mendoza, 17, learned this week he had been accepted by the prestigious Ivy League school.

His father, Mike Mendoza, said the Indiana Harbor area resident plans to major in chemistry.

“This young man is destined for great things,” Central High Principal Larry Allen said. “He’s a terrific role model, and we’re all very proud of him.”

Manuel Mendoza comes from a class of very smart students in the city, said Kristin Frank, a teacher for the group through the gifted and talented program at Franklin Elementary School.

“He’s had a plan since sixth grade to go to Harvard,” Frank said. “He’s absolutely brilliant — they’re people I will never forget.”

Manuel Mendoza is putting in long hours after class with the school’s award-winning Science Olympiad team, his father said, in preparation for next month’s competition.

As a sophomore in 2008, Mendoza was part of the first-ever Central High science team to make it to the state finals.

“It’s great that Manuel has chosen Harvard for his continuing education,” Allen said. “There are many schools in Indiana that have never had a student attend Harvard.”

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series

During these difficult economic times there are many losers, including our land, water, air, biology and the local population. This is especially amplified by the more than 40-years since the Industry’s fortunes where coupled with those of the community’s. The results of this decoupling can be horribly seen in the our cultural landscape of existing conditions,

This is what I see when I look at existing conditions and opportunities along the southern shores of Lake Michigan here in East Chicago. Below you will find someone else’s vision which is limited to reindustrialize our lakefront.

Existing Conditions:

• A Gated Industrial Community
• Arguably the most polluted waters in the country - the Indiana Harbor Shipping Canal (IHSC)
  • Joerse Beach: most contaminated beach in the Great Lakes and third most in the country.
• Arguably the most polluted air-shed in the country - Lake county indiana ranking as the 9th most polluted air-shed in the country with the sources of pollution concentrated on East Chicago’s lakefront
• >80% of East Chicago’s land-use is dedicated to heavy industry - ~50 of these industrial lands are out of productive use and considered contaminated, e.g., brownfields
  • 14% of East Chicago’s land-use is dedicated Residential - ~17% of these residential properties are apart of a superfund site.

via [ NWI Times ]

“Blast furnace restart could jump-start 750 jobs - MARKET DEMAND PROMPTS MITTAL TO FIRE UP INDIANA HARBOR WORKS NO. 4 FURNACE” by

Read more…

Thomas East Chicago, Northwest Indiana, View of Lake Michigan

As you can see I have been a skeptic of the EPA”s recent challenge to BP’s air permit.

<fb comment> a small victory. The EPA has order Indiana to rewrite the permit, essentially discrediting Indiana’s ability to manage their environmental resources. All I see this doing is fortifying a poorly written permit against future disputes. In the end BP is the beneficiary of the action</fb comment>

Noah Hall, author of the Great Lakes Law blog is beginning to clear me of my skepticism.

via [ Great Lakes Law ]

Tar sands oil gives coal some competition for the title of dirtiest fuel.  From mining to refining to burning, tar sands oil is an environmental disaster.  The Great Lakes is becoming a center for refining imported tar sands oil, which comes from western Canada.  As a result, refinery pollution is threatening our water and our communities.  BP’s Whiting Refinery on the shores of Lake Michigan in Indiana has become a focal point in the legal fight to stop tar sands pollution in the region.  Environmental groups scored a victory earlier this month when the EPA objected to an Indiana permit for air pollution from the refinery.  Meleah Geertsma, an attorney and public health expert with the Environmental Law and Policy Center in Chicago, was involved in the fight against the air pollution from the tar sands refinery, and wrote this guest post on the victory and what it means in the fight against tar sands pollution in the Great Lakes.

On October 16, in a move that could significantly improve air quality for the Great Lakes region, the U.S. EPA sent a clear message to the oil industry that the federal agency is serious about air pollution from refining – especially the processing of dirty Canadian tar sands crude. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson on that day issued an order objecting to a permit granted by Indiana to BP’s Whiting Refinery, located on the shores of Lake Michigan. At the heart of Administrator Jackson’s order is a concern that numerous potential sources of air pollution are going uncounted and uncontrolled. And that the industry is ignoring or downplaying the air pollution impacts of processing the much heavier, dirtier Canadian tar sands crude, a crude that contains high levels of sulfur and toxic metals.

The BP operating permit was issued to enable a significant increase in the processing of heavy tar sands crude at BP’s Whiting, Indiana facility. However, the permit allowed BP to expand without installing so-called “best available control technology,” on the premise that increases in air pollution from the expansion would be balanced by decreases in pollution from the existing refinery. Such a trade-off of increases and decreases is referred to in air permitting as “netting.”

In response, several environmental groups and individual citizens filed a petition with U.S. EPA, asking the agency to object due to BP’s and the agency’s failure to count numerous potential sources of increased air pollution. Among these sources are increased operations of certain equipment needed to process larger amounts of Canadian crude, as well as greater levels of sulfur and toxics in the crude itself.

Great Lakes Law: Environmental groups and EPA step up the fight against tar sands oil refinery pollution in the Great Lakes.

Thomas East Chicago, Environment, The Air I Breath

I don’t think I’ve mentioned on this blog before how extraordinarily violent East Chicago is. I spoke to Nora Ferrer and her brother today. They lost their brother to gun violence 11-years ago. I am terribly sorry for their loss. Nora and other women including her mother have channelled their loss in an effort to help the community.

During the past two decades East Chicago has experienced between 15-to-32 murders a year. That is more than 200 murders in two decades in a city of 30,000 people. You do the math.

Several years ago I worked with At-Risk-Teens. To get to know them I decided I would video interview them individually. In the process of interviewing them I was shocked to discovered that each one of these kids had one or more family members murdered, some had actually seen them die.

More recently, my brother-in-law, who coaches basketball, had a player who was murdered on his way home from practice. This effected him and his players deeply as it did many other school kids. It turned out the murderer was the Chief of Police’s nephew.

A problem we face here when something as horrific as this occurs is the lack of grief counseling for those effected. When this occurred my wife contacted a counselor at the University of Chicago who organized a group of counselors to donate their time, but the East Chicago school district, and teacher’s Union would not allow them to come in and help. Consequently no one ever received the counseling they desperately needed. This is a problem that repeats itself 15-to-32 times a year.

You can only imagine what this level of chronic violence and grief without aid is doing to this community.

P.S. { lifted from a comment I made on Facebook }
“Last month I witnessed a 13 year-old neighbor girl get mugged in front of my house and I called 911 while following the muggers. 911 told me they wouldn’t send anyone and that I ought to stop following them. When I returned home an officer was talking with the girl. The officer never asked me for a statement. When I told him what just happened to me with the 911 operator, he responded “well, we only have four officers on the streets, and can’t cover everything.” At that moment Debbie Balonous (sp?) came up, knowing the girl - she was truly concerned, but when she saw I was involved and heard the answer I just got from the officer, she just backed away and left.

I’m beginning to feel there are too many people in this city with family members or friends who are involved in criminal activity and no one wants to stand up against friends and family.”

Thomas East Chicago

Report [ Wasting Our Waterways: Toxic Industrial Pollution and the Unfulfilled Promise of the Clear Water Act ]

Indiana industries discharge 33% more toxins into its waterways than any other state. This is more than the following 26 states combined (Idaho, Delaware, West Virginia, Oregon, Tennessee, South Dakota, Minnesota, Maryland, Missouri, Washington, Florida, Kansas, Michigan, Hawaii, Connecticut, Vermont, Montana, Utah, North Dakota, Alaska, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Dist. Of Columbia, Massachusetts, Wyoming, Rhode Island, Arizona, Nevada). Together these states have a population of 100.1 million people compared to Indiana’s 6.4 million people. That is 15-times the population of Indiana.

Indiana also discharges more toxins than Colorado, Maine, Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, California, and Wisconsin Combined. Together these states have a population of 59.8 million people compared to Indiana’s 6.4 million people. That is 10-times the population of Indiana.

However we chunk-out this data (lbs./state GDP, lbs./medium income, lbs./capita) it does not bode well for the residents of Indiana.

via [ Gary Post-Tribune ] by Gitte Laasby

Northwest Indiana and the Hoosier state received more dubious environmental distinctions Wednesday in a new report about toxic water pollution.

Indiana industries led the nation in toxic chemical discharges in 2007 at 27.3 million pounds, according to the report.

Northwest Indiana is home to five of the 10 rivers in Indiana where polluters discharged the most toxic chemicals: the Grand Calumet River, Lake Michigan, Burns Ditch, Indiana Harbor Ship Canal and the Little Calumet River.

The report by Environment Illinois is based on 2007 data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxic Release Inventory, to which industries self-report their discharges over a certain threshold.

“The Clean Water Act set a goal for making all the waters in the nation fishable and swimmable,” said Max Muller, a spokesman for Environment Illinois, adding only about half meet the goal. “Industrial pollution is one of the significant causes for that.”

Among the most severe effects of water pollution is death of wildlife, but toxic chemicals also have the potential to trigger cancer and reproductive and developmental problems in humans who eat contaminated fish, the report states.

Of the Northwest Indiana rivers, the Grand Calumet River received the most toxic pollution in 2007, more than 1.6 million pounds. Lake Michigan was second at more than 118,000 pounds.

The report also looked specifically at toxics linked to developmental disorders. The Indiana Harbor Ship Canal received the 19th-largest amount of those toxics in the nation — 4,010 pounds.

Northwest Indiana had four waterways on the list of the nation’s top 50 that received the most reproductive toxicant releases, Lake Michigan, the Little Calumet River, the Grand Calumet River and Burns Ditch.

The report indirectly blames Northwest Indiana’s steel mills for most of the pollution. ArcelorMittal Indiana Harbor in East Chicago is listed as releasing the 12th most reproductive toxicants in the nation — 3,910 pounds into the Indiana Harbor Ship Canal. U.S. Steel Gary Works is 15th in the nation in the same category, having released 2,781 pounds of toxics into Lake Michigan and the Grand Calumet River.

The report recommends that the federal government phase out use of the worst chemicals and encourage development and use of safer alternatives. It also recommended improving enforcement and ratcheting down pollution levels in industrial permits.

The most polluted river in the nation, according to TRI, is the Ohio River, which flows through six states including Indiana. It received 31 million pounds of toxic chemicals in 2007.Source: “Wasting Our Waterways: Toxic Industrial Pollution and the Unfulfilled Promise of the Clean Water Act” 2009, Environment Illinois

Environmental report gives NWI another bad mark :: Local News :: Post-Tribune.

Thomas East Chicago, Environment

I wonder to what extent the EPA’s recent order that “IDEM rewrite BP’s air permit” can be said to challenge IDEM’s ability to properly discharge its responsibility and manage the state’s environmental resources?

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is forcing the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to rewrite part of the air permit for BPs Whiting refinery. EPA said BP?and IDEM left out several sources of air pollution that need to be counted when determining what kind of air pollution control equipment is necessary

EPA: BP permit must be rewritten :: Post-Tribune.

Thomas East Chicago, The Air I Breath

Thomas East Chicago, What I am Looking at

Oh Lord, I know I’ve been forever changed by the conflict between these two lives. Being immersed in the mill, I’ve become like the steel I work: cold, hard, sharp, heavy, dirty, bent, flawed, and rusting, Yet through other’s eyes, I am useful, durable, and to an extent even valuable.

- By Greg Gvotny “Going to the Mill,” the Heat

Thomas East Chicago, Misc

[ Ameristar ]

This post is mostly for local consumption as they are well aware of the issues surrounding Casino Funds. Like many, I am not an advocate for casinos, but surprisingly the success of the entertainment and gaming market in East Chicago is a clear indication that East Chicago is a viable host for markets other than heavy industry.

At Issue: Where Casino Funds are committed

Background: At the time the gaming application was being drafted the community, viewing the political establishment as corrupt, were unwilling to approve a gaming permit in East Chicago if local politicians had total control over the funds. Thus the creation of a not-for-profit foundation was included in the agreement. Today Mayor Pabey is seeking total control over casino funds, and spending millions of dollars on Republican lawyers to do so.

A) State law applies to all cities with gaming and commits:

1. 5% of gaming taxes to be paid to the City
2. a “head tax” of $1.00 for each boat visitor to be paid to the City

B) The final agreement negotiated with the gaming operator over and beyond state statue commits:

1. the gamer to pay an additional 1% gaming revenue to the City
2. the gamer to pay an additional 2% gaming revenue to two non-profit foundations known as the Foundations of East Chicago (FEC)
3. the gamer to pay an additional 1% gaming revenue to Second Century Corp, a for-profit org.

.

On August 27, 2009 the NWI Times ran this editorial.

OUR OPINION: GIVE EAST CHICAGO THE SAME KIND OF ARRANGEMENT OTHER CASINO HOST CITIES HAVE INSTEAD OF DIVERTING MUCH OF THE REVENUE TO THE NONPROFIT FOUNDATIONS OF EAST CHICAGO AND THE FOR-PROFIT SECOND CENTURY CORP

For the vast majority of the Time’s audience, on first blush, this argument appears to be common sense. But for those who are well aware of East Chicago politics, they can see plainly how the Times is manufacturing public opinion around the taking of community focused funds from this enormously impoverished community. In the editorial the Times employs a rhetorical slight of hand switching “A” with “B” (from above) and expecting their average reader not to know the difference. The following is my response to the above editorial. It was sent to the Times as a Letter-to-the-editor. Doug Ross, the Times editorial page editor, requested I revise the letter down to 200 words, which I did. The letter was never published, so I’m publishing here.

Your editorial concerning the East Chicago gaming funds is counterfactual to the evidence you present and the conclusions you make.

You acknowledge that “Each Hoosier city hosting a casino has its own agreement for how the city should benefit from the casino,” It then follows that each city has a “unique” agreement through which casinos enter into to provide more than the taxes they are required. The amounts and the manner in which Indiana casinos have agreed to pay beyond their statutory share vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and just as important, those amounts may be paid directly to charitable organizations or to governmental organizations. In East Chicago, the casino pays its agreed amounts both to the City and private organizations, as is the case in several other Indiana gaming jurisdictions.

It is not unusual for businesses to set up non-profit organizations for distributing charitable contributions. In fact the RDA is based on the same model as the foundations of East Chicago. Both are non-profit organizations funded by casino funds. The difference is the Foundations of East Chicago distributes their funds within the community the casino resides, while the RDA redistributes their funds throughout the region.

Additionally, you fail to acknowledge your own critical editorial entitled “Mayor Pabey, tear down that wall of secrecy,” 3/22/09, where you draw attention to the City’s lack of public disclosure of information, to the community or the press. Similarly, members of the Common Council have not received information, and have resorted to lawsuits.

This situation merits a comparison between the foundations of East Chicago and the city on how casino funds have been managed and spent. Contrary to the Foundation of East Chicago, which has held several open public meetings attended by more than 200 residents to plan out the use of their funds, the city has never held such a meeting. And upon review of receipts of city casino funds, attained through Indiana Access to Public Records Act (APRA) request by the Indiana State Gaming Commission, reveals many questionable expenditures including but not limited to a $20,000 legal settlement by the law department, headed by the Mayor’s cousin, Carmen Fernandez, to the Mayor’s other cousin William Pabey for pleading guilty of theft at the casino.

I would like to believe the NWI Time’s editorial staff is capable of coming to conclusions that are consistent and supported by evidence they present.

<End Notes>
45% of the casino was originally owned by a group of investors called Waterfront Entertainment and Development Inc. This group had 13 original investors, including Mayor Pabey. Article

Additionally, the State Board of Account’s 2005 Annual Financial Review of the City of East Chicago cites the Pabey Administration for spending $1.5 million in gaming funds without budget approval (page 48). (900k pdf) - View Document

“Upon review of expenditures from both funds, amounts were being spent prior to the budgets being approved. As of October 31 2005, $9,832,551 was spent from the Gaming Special Revenue Fund. At this date, the City has an appropriation in the amount of $5,000,000, and had prior year encumbrances totaling $3,292,088; thus, the City had spent $1,540,463 over what had been appropriated to that date.

Indiana Code 36-4-8-2 states in part:
“Money may be paid out of the city treasury only on warrant of the city fiscal officer. Unless a statue provides otherwise, the fiscal officer may draw a warrent against a fund of the city only if:

(1) an appropriation has been made for that purpose and the appropriation is not exhausted;…”

</End Notes>

Thomas East Chicago, Local

@ [ Thomasfrank.org ]

2009 Mexican Independence Parade: Slideshow (260 images, 13 min.)

You may have noticed I’ve been testing out different tools for displaying large amounts of images. This is one approach I think I may look to develop further. Unfortunately, there is limited functionality, as I could not post it to this blog.

This is the first edition of a new project called the “East Chicago Portrait Series.” I hope this piece shows the strength and energy of the Latino Culture here in the E.C. You can see from the photos how much the Latino Culture is thoroughly apart of the East Chicago identity, and the complexity of that identity. East Chicago breaks from many stereotypes. There is a back-story to many of the images. I know several of the people in the slideshow. Many are my neighbors.

I think this format offers an important framework that often goes missing in planning documents. It begins to give character to both the people and their public spaces, giving some insight into the development, the population, and the uses of this particular public space. Although many in the Parade are East Chicagoan’s, some of the traditional and more iconic costuming of Hispanic culture are hired entertainers.

Thomas East Chicago Portrait Series

via the [ NYTimes ]

This is an incredible series.

>500,000 Violations of the Clean Water Act in the last 5 Years

“Fewer than 3 percent of Clean Water Act violations resulted in fines or other significant punishments by state officials.”

[ Information Graphics ]

“Almost four decades after Congress passed the Clean Water Act, the rate of water pollution violations is rising steadily. In the past five years, companies and workplaces have violated pollution laws more than 500,000 times. But the vast majority of polluters have escaped punishment.”

[ Find the Polluter Near You ]

Indiana's Environmental Stewardship on the Southern Shores of Lake Michigan in Bright Orange

Clean Water Act Violations on Indiana’s Urban Shores of Lake Michigan

East Chicago (My Town) = 277
Gary = 304
Hammond = 253
Whiting = 16
Portage = 68
Burns Harbor = 63
Michigan City = 119

TOTAL = 1,100 Violations

IF inspections were up to date (random but regularly), we would undoubtedly see a radical increase in violations. Some facilities have not seen inspections in more than 11 years, other have no record of inspections - An unacceptable regulatory practice.

What this data does not share is the magnitude of a violation or impact a violation has on the local watershed, nor does it tell us about the total aggregate impact permitted sites have on those systems, and whether we have already saturated those systems to capacity.

Here in indiana we depend on a system of DILUTION AS THE SOLUTION, NATURAL ATTENUATION, and the ENTOMBMENT of contaminants into the sediments of our watersheds to manage the quality of our water resources. IDEM operates without an understanding of what the accumulated harm a hundred years of intense industrialization has done to the carrying capacity of these natural systems. Over time these systems have become severely stressed and degraded lessening their capacity to produce positive results on equivalent levels of contamination as it had only decade ago.

“Across the nation, the system that Congress created to protect the nation’s waters under the Clean Water Act of 1972 today often fails to prevent pollution. The New York Times has compiled data on more than 200,000 facilities that have permits to discharge pollutants and collected responses from states regarding compliance. Information about facilities contained in this database comes from two sources: the Environmental Protection Agency and the California State Water Resources Control Board. The database does not contain information submitted by the states.”

Thomas East Chicago, The Water I Drink

In a previous post To Grandma’s House We Go I tried to show in a simple real life example the importance of community focused planning, and how incompatible the present land use patterns in East Chicago are for the activities of children. I also did a post on Portages catalytic project - a subarea plan of the Marquette Plan. In this post I tried to show how Portage benefits from implementing their catalytic project, with a strategy very similar to East Chicago - little exposure to the lake but utilizing their riverfront to realize greater opportunities. With the Comprehensive Plan, East Chicago threw away the Marquette Plan’s catalytic project.

There is no greater canvas than what is writ on the land. There is no better way to understand who we are than how we allocate resources and provide for ourselves - that is what comprehensive planning is about.

<Background>
In 2006, as president of Redevelopment, I was asked to participate in the Mayor’s weekly economic development meetings. This was something I had been requesting. These meetings included representatives from the major industries in the City, including BP, ArcelorMittal, Kemira, NIPSCO (Northern Indiana Public Service Company, electric utility),  and the Northwest Indiana Forum (a regional economic development corp), and a few department heads. I was tapped to work on a sub committee to inventory and characterize underutilized parcels and prepare market them. The committee was headed up by Eric Pritcher (a NIPSCO representative), and included John Artist (E.C. Director of Redevelopment), Jimmy Ventura (E.C. Director of Economic Development), Kay Nelson (Environmental Director at the Forum), and Diane Thalmann (Director of Economic Development NIPSCO). When I walked into my first meeting Kay Nelson was going through the inventory of properties and discussing land use. I asked one question “who is determining land use?” Kay responded “they were.” I then asked if this ought to go through a comprehensive planning process.

Well I continued to advocate for a comprehensive plan, suggesting that the kinds of initiatives the city had planned would require the authority of a comprehensive plan. The city tried it their way until they realized they were required to bring their plans to the residents.

Eventually the Mayor appointed me to chair a staring committee to conduct a comprehensive plan for the city. In this role I managed a process of consensus building in defining goals and objectives, determine how to finance the process, authoring an RFQ (request for qualifications) for a planning entity, manage the interview process, and final selection. However, once the actual planning process began I was relieved of my duties and the City engaged the planners (in this case the Lakota group) themselves, and I became just another homeowner with a private interest in the community.
</Background>

The following are the comments I submitted in response to the city’s proposed concepts. I’ve included three maps of existing land use, proposed land use, and my comments on land use adjacent to our waterways. I could have submitted many more comments, but I felt it most important to focus on a Catalytic framework for the community. In essence - a first order of business for properties that are held in common - our waterfronts.

East Chicago 2007 Comprehensive Plan

My Comments

Comments to Proposed Scenarios:

My comments focus on the beneficial potential of our waterway and Lakefront to meet the demographic and economic needs of the coming generations. I strongly believe that development must occur in an environmentally responsible and sustainable manner. This does not discount industry. It is a part of our foreseeable future, but after 30 years of an industrial depression industry cannot be our ONLY future. Re-industrialization alone, will continue our present state of depression. We must provide the quality of life our educated children demand when they choose a community to live and raise their children.

1) Lakefront Development: I support plans that would reposition these lands as public lands with public access, not private condos and a yacht club.

2) Trail System: Create a trail system throughout our waterways, connecting our neighborhoods from the south to the north and to the Lakefront. This is an opportunity to use a natural trail system to bridge gaps with in the community and re-connect our isolated neighborhoods. Unfortunately, each concept presented proposes to add additional industrial uses between the community and natural areas, continuing to repeat bad practices of cutting neighborhoods off from each other and community focused assets - nature.

3) Mittal Property: This is possibly the most significant piece of property in East Chicago. How we determine its future use will determine the possibilities for the next generations to come. This land is presently a decommissioned Mittal property that is adjacent to future consolidated plans of the plant. It has water access on the canal and is adjacent to the core of North Harbor. This property is also in walking distance to the Lakefront.

Besides Concept C of the “Dickey Road Industrial Area” there is no other community focus redevelopment of these industrial lands that can serve as a buffer between such absolutely incompatible uses (Heavy Industry / Residential). This is one reuse scenario vs. two reindustrialization scenarios. Concept C will need to be flexible if it is to be seriously considered, and I believe strongly that this concept ought to serve as the foundation for land reuse discussions and not an outlier in those discussions. If this recreation scenario is not acceptable then we ought to consider other less intense uses, such as passive green space. We can also consider a land trusts. Openlands has a very good relationship with Mittal and would be interested in aiding these discussions.

4) Mittal’s Electric Furnace: I suspect Mittal has requested that we leave this parcel out of any discussions. I understand Mittal has been planning to decommission its present use in the near future. However, it will be important to any future discussions on this side of the canal

5) Turning Basin: It is important not to accept a short-sided plan that only re-industrializes the underutilized land. This parcel is well positioned to serve as a waterway focus development that is more compatible with nearby neighborhoods and perhaps serve as an access point for the community. It could easily serve as an anchor and catalytic project for future development along the waterways. I can imagine a dry dock area. I have talked to the land owner and he is open to the idea.

6) Property along North sea-wall of the Indiana Harbor Shipping Canal: This is a great opportunity to assemble these near-shore properties for natural areas and trails. Industry can continue to operate as they have. U.S. Gypsum has already developed plans, in partnership with Daniel Goldfarb of the Wildlife Habitat Council, to do natural plantings and trails. Daniel has also worked with Conoco Phillips and Citgo to develop similar plans on their properties in East Chicago.

7) CDF: We need to work quickly with the U.S.A.C.E. to develop greenery along the southern and eastern edges of the property. The south because it is across the canal from proposed recreation, and the east because it sits at a major gateway to the city.

8) Natural Area: This is a natural wetland that has never been developed. While there are no remaining natural assets with public access within the city, Industrializing this land today does not make any sense. There is an opportunity to open this land to a trail system and extend the green space north to Columbus drive.

9) Area bordered by the Canal to its east, Railroad avenue to the west, Columbus Drive to the North, and the CSX Line to the south: Plans are underway to clean the southern branch of the Grand Calumet River. This opens opportunities to create community focus development along its banks and extend the neighborhood to the east side of Railroad avenue. There is enough acreage for about 400 homes and green space. This kind of development would justify cost associated with preparing these lands for new uses. I suggest developing a program to relocate businesses to the planned industrial park north of the canal.

10) TOD: This is a great opportunity to leverage a strategy for the airport for the benefit of East Chicago. By extending the South Shore to the Airport down the CSX line, just north of Chicago Avenue, the airport gets much needed access to the Chicago business travel market, and East Chicago gets a TOD opportunity near its downtown (Indianapolis and Chicago ave). The CSX traffic could be rerouted south to the 9^th expansion bridge. This would bolster East Chicago’s retail district and link our municipal functions more directly with the Chicago market. It would also give the housing starts identified in #9 a strong reason for attracting young professionals and create a walkable community once again around our downtown district.

11) Green Space along southern Fork in the Canal: 90% of the proposed green space in this Plan is DNR property along the Grand Calumet River. Each Alternate Scenario in this Comprehensive Plan proposes to re-industrialize the land between our neighborhoods and these natural areas. These once again repeat bad past practice by cutting off neighborhoods from each and community focused assets. If anything we ought to use natural areas to buffer neighborhoods for industry. Not the inverse which is what is proposed. To be consistent with the DNR natural areas I suggest creating a strategy to extend these areas to our neighborhoods starting with this parcel.

12) Industrial Property along Cline: This property is within a half mile of the East Calumet neighborhood. It is inappropriate for heavy industrial use. Let’s again stop repeating past mistakes. I suggest light industrial uses servicing the airport. We also need to provide significant buffers between the neighborhood and its industrial neighbors.

13) Alternate Flight Pattern from the Gary Airport: I have a petition with more than 200 signatures asking for the flight pattern to be diverted away from Guadeloupe Circle, Prairie Park and Washington Park neighborhoods. These neighborhoods represent the only sustaining middle class neighborhoods in East Chicago. These neighborhoods include two elementary schools, a middle school and a hospital. The noise pollution in these neighborhoods due to the present flight pattern consistently rises above 90 decibels. Absolutely unacceptable.

14) Brownfield Strategy: Lastly this plan lacks any brownfield redevelopment framework necessary to diversify landuses and our local economy. With 40% of our industrial land out of productive use East Chicago is in serious need of a brownfield redevelopment framework. Without it East Chicago can not avail themselves of Federal Brownfield redevelopment funds to inventory, characterize, remediate these properties so as to put them into new uses. All of which the USEPA has already promised to fund for this City. To neglect it is criminal.

General Thoughts

Existing Conditions:

1) ~80% of E.C. is zoned Heavy Industry, with about 40% of our industrial lands are out-of-use. With advances in technology and the U.S. economy shifting to a service oriented economy, we have endured 30 years of a industrial depression. Re-industrialization is what E.C. has always done. Today, East Chicago is no longer the center for Jobs it ones was. In fact, the city is now the largest single employer of East Chicagoans, employing 1,300 people (these are considered service jobs). This does not including School City, the Library and the other taxing districts. The Comprehensive Plan does nothing to reposition the use of these most impaired lands to meet the needs of a contemporary American community / economy.

2) Incompatible uses: During the settlement of East Chicago, housing and industry went hand in hand. It was during this era that Sunnyside, Washington Park and Marktown were developed. Each was developed with generous natural buffers between them and industry. A 100 years of industrialization has brought continued encroachment of industry on these neighborhoods, cutting them off from there surroundings, and essentially creating the condition for blight. This has resulted in homeowners losing the wealth creation potential necessary for a sustainable community and supporting retail businesses in the downtown district. Today this is unacceptable and this plan does nothing to mitigate against these impacts, but does quite the contrary and creates the conditions for more stress on homeowners. Our community is a pattern of heavy industry adjacent to neighborhoods (such as North Harbor and Mittal, East Calumet and Citgo). In some cases industry surrounds the neighborhood (such as Marktown, and New Addition). The Comprehensive Plan does nothing to reconnect isolated neighborhoods, buffer them better from industry, or reclaim any of the abandoned industrial properties as a community focused asset.

3) Question: How many communities in America have Oil Refineries (the size of BP - the Largest inland refinery) and Steel Mills (Mittal)? And how many of them are in small densely populated urban communities? I will go out on a limb to suggest that there are none besides East Chicago. Lake County ranks as the seventh most toxic county in the nation (out of 3140 counties), with 50.3 million pounds of chemicals released in 2005 (based on TRI data), or 20 percent of the state’s total output. These discharges are attributed to three industries located in or around East Chicago (BP, Mittal, and U.S. Steel). For the sake of the residents don’t you think there is too much industry, and pollution concentrated in such a small area? This plan ought to propose a strategy to address the negative impact industry has on the Quality of life of the residents and establish a compatible land use strategy so that both Industry and resident’s can prosper?

With out improving the Quality of Life, East Chicago will not attract young professionals to live here, not even our children, who have gone off to receive an education. The Marquette Plan addressed these issues by repositioning the region economically and environmentally and focusing on our strongest asset - our lake and waterways (the place where our older industries occupied).

Comprehensive Plan Concepts vs. The Marquette Plan

In light of the fact that the land use scenarios proposed by the Comprehensive Plan are in direct opposition to the Marquette Plan, I believe it is important to draw out the comparisons.

The Comprehensive Plan focuses exclusively on a single dimension of the Marquette Plan, the reaffirmation of its lost industrial base. Hence, the RE-INDUSTRIALIZATION OF EAST CHICAGO. There is little attempt in the Comprehensive Plan to diversify land use, clean-up our most contaminated properties, and improve the quality of life for residents. There is no formal Brownfield framework for addressing these issues. How can East Chicago reposition our economy to meet the needs of a contemporary American community if we do not address the impairments at the base of our economy?

a. The Marquette Plan focused on our most environmentally impaired and out-of-use lands along the canal and where the market has not been able to function.

b. The Marquette Plan repositions the land adjacent to North Harbor towards community focus development. Besides Concept C of the “Dickey Road Industrial Area” there is no community focus redevelopment on these adjacent lands in the Comprehensive Plan. This is one reuse scenario vs. two reindustrialization scenarios. Concept C will need to be flexible if it is to be seriously considered, and I believe strongly that this concept ought to serve as a beginning for land reuse discussions and not an outlier in those discussions.

c. The Marquette Plan takes in to account that heavy industry is consolidating and encourages it to move up the peninsula and north of the canal away from neighborhoods. This again is contrary to the Comprehensive Plan, which has no apparent concern for these incompatible adjacent uses.

d. The Marquette Plan creates buffers between heavy industry and our neighborhoods in North Harbor, Marktown and New Addition. This begins to address the depressed housing market and blight we see in these neighborhoods by pulling industry away from where people live. A major characteristic of the Comprehensive Plan is the lack of buffering between such incompatible uses (Heavy Industry and Residential).

e. The Marquette Plan proposes to pull down Cline Avenue and reroute traffic along the rail line and directly into the steel plant, giving the community access to these newly available lands along the canal. The Comprehensive Plan maintains Cline avenue as a formidable barrier to community focus development.

f. The Marquette Plan adds much needed public access and green space to East Chicago along our waterways and Lake. The Comprehensive Plan pretends to add public access and green spaces. It proposes private development in all scenarios on our lakefront (Condos and a Yacht club). Re-industrialization is also a commitment to private development along our waterways. The green space along the Grand Calumet River is in fact in DNR control and for the protection of these lands. The Comprehensive Plan proposes to sever access between our neighborhoods and these much needed natural areas with industry.

g. The Marquette Plan creates an opportunity for a trail system throughout our waterways, connecting our neighborhoods from the south to the north and to the Lakefront. The Comprehensive Plan add no additional trails to the DNR plans and does not leverage the open area along the canal, but again proposes to re-industrialize these lands.

NOTE: Within the next 10 years an environmental cleanup of the Grand Calumet River will be complete, opening adjacent lands to new use. To place industry back on these lands make as much sense as allowing U.S. Steel to pollute into the Grand Calumet River after a $20 million clean up job.

East Chicago's Marquette Plan

East Chicago’s replacement of the Marquette plan focuses on private condo development on the lake front and pushes community open space to the other side of Cline Avenue (a state highway). To do this they have propose to move the water filtration facility to make room for the private development. To implement this plan they have seeked and received RDA funds, and stimulus funds. What could have been an increase in public access amenities has turned into a private affair for the Mayor’s funders, <RED FLAG>yacht club included</RED FLAG>. It must be noted that east Chicago has 7.3 miles of lakefront exposure and only 100 yards of public access. This proposal does not increase public access. Thusly it ought not to qualify for public dollars.

In absent of a solid well thought out proposal for redevelopment along our waterways and Lakefront I propose that the Comprehensive Plan adopt the Marquette Plan as its waterway and Lakefront component.

Thomas Case Studies, East Chicago, Planning Mishaps

East Chicago Indiana, August 30, 2009

On August 30, 2009 our family took a bike ride (white dotted line in above map) from our house in Indiana Harbor to Grandma’s house on the East Chicago side of town. The ride is ~2.2 miles through a variety of landscapes including heavy Industrial. There are only two ways to get from the Harbor side to the East Chicago side. You either take Columbus Drive or Chicago Avenue. Neither are very friendly toward bikers or walkers, not to mention children. Besides the occasional metal scraper lugging overly large qualities of metal on bikes it is very rare to see anyone walking or riding through these corridors. We tend to ride our bikes within the neighborhood or load the bikes in the bed of the truck and ride elsewhere. But on this day it was gorgeous we took a tour down Columbus Drive.

Google map tour of our bike ride with photos from the above slideshow.

Background / Strengths / Weaknesses

Regardless of what officials say, East Chicago is not community or child focused. There is no access to nature within the community, nor are there any friendly corridors for children to travel on to get through the community. In fact the community is so fragmented by industrial interests that I have begun to compare it to the land fragmentation in Palestine. Granted the comparison is limited. A sure sign of public corruption is the lack of community focused planning and development.

Local environmentalists, particularly Mark Reskin of IUN, often argue that industry was the first to settle East Chicago and housing encroached on the industry, as if that would be an argument for the kind of environmental devastation that has occurred under his tenure. The fact is the earliest settlers were not industry, but pioneers and hunters. Later in the 1800’s  wealthy Chicagoan’s built large vacation homes on the East Chicago shores, and highlands. I realize it is difficult for many to recognize any of the regions natural features, but this was once a region of ancient dunes and swales and natural marshlands.

When industry first came to these shores, they brought with them worker villages, such as Sunnyside and Marktown, to attract a stable workforce. They also demolished or moved the large homes. During this period housing and industry went hand in hand, as they looked to build a workable community. Industrial and community leaders went to great efforts to hire some of the countries best landscape designers and architects, and built a world-class library system and recreation facilities.

It is often thought that industry constructed these villages adjacent to their factories in a hap-hazard manner, so that workers could walk to work. When you review these early settlement patterns you can see how natural buffers and distance had been used to separate housing from industry. In fact Marktown’s original designs were based on Ebenezer Howard’s Garden City concept. Thus Buffering between these two incompatible adjacent uses goes back over 150 years and was written into East Chicago’s early city plans. I’m not suggesting that these buffers, with our present understanding of environmental hazard, were adequate, but it does reveal how the original intent of the designs and concepts acknowledged the need for them.

<slight tangent>
I find it remarkable to see the development of suburban corporate headquarters around Chicago (down the I-80 corridor, I-90, and the northshore), provide generous buffering between their office complexes and the surrounding community. In recent years many of these developments have become LEED certified. Yet in East Chicago some of these same corporations provide no buffering between their industrial complexes and the surround community. I don’t have to mention that none of the facilities are LEED certified. An interesting case is the BP campus in Naperville, which used to be located in Whiting until they could no longer attract professionals to the area do to the lack of quality of life, and yes BP’s campus is LEED certified.
</slight tangent>

What actually occurred here over the last hundred years was the continual encroachment of industry interests on residential quality of life, and the taking of community and private residential wealth. Each new industry involved not only a taking of public and private property, but a taking of community values and visions. Every successive period involved a massive taking of community wealth in the service of industrial benefit. It must be noted that this taking of the public and the personal wealth of the residents could not be done by industry alone. It required the participation of local, regional and state governments, and later included environmentalist.

This encroachment continues today as BP expands its facilities, by placing six cokers just across the street from one of our neighborhoods. Local tif districts had to rewrite their schedules to take into account the future increased assessed value that would be lost due to the BP project - a clear demonstration of the taking of private homeowner wealth for industry interests. In the 1980’s a whole neighborhood was demolished to make way for Pollution Control Industries (PCI). Praxair sits on what was once public property with plans developed for a central park uniting the East Chicago and Harbor sides.

Today’s challenges:

• High concentration of heavy industry
  • More than 80% of East Chicago is zoned heavy industrial with ~14% zoned residential.
  • 40% of industrial properties are out of production and considered to be a brownfield
  • About 15% of residential properties are apart of the USEPA Superfund site - Calumet neighborhood.
• Fourteen fairly isolated neighborhoods with little to no linkage between them, cut off by industry. Several neighborhoods suffer from incompatible adjacent uses, such as chemical, oil, or manufacturing plants. The result is that many neighborhoods have their own identity and community center.
• Little or no access to natural areas
  • East Chicago has 7.3 miles of lakefront Exposure with only 100 yards accessible to the public - Joerse beach.
  • Yet Jeorse Beach is such an impaired asset that it ranks 3rd in the country, and 1st on the great lakes, for beach closings due to hight bacteria level.
  • Dupont prairies, with ancient dune and swales is highly contaminated and not accessible to the the public.
  • No bike trails
• Lake County ranks as the 7th most polluted county in the country (out of 3141 counties). The pollution is mainly attributed to three major industries which reside in or within a half mile of East Chicago: BP (largest oil refinery in the midwest, second largest in the country), ArcelorMittal (largest integrated steel mill in the country), and US Steel. These industries represent tens-of-billions-of-dollars of interests in East Chicago. I suggest Lake county aim at being just average - ranked 1570 out of 3141 counties.
• Location of 2 (Kemira, Dover Chemical) of the top 101 most dangerous chemical facilities [ Link to report ]
• The Indiana Harbor Shipping Canal is also considered to be the most polluted waterway in the country.
• Depressed downtown with many vacancies, making most residents auto dependent for shopping.
• Blighted neighborhoods and housing stock. The medium home value in several of our neighborhoods is less than $25,000
• No sustained cultural institutions.
• High Crime
• Poor Educational system - ranks last in the state of Indiana on ISTEP test
• Political/industrial/environmental corruption

East Chicago is a clear and obvious point source to our shared environmental challenges. I truly believe the extreme nature of East Chicago’s environmental impairments qualify it to be ground-zero in the environmental and sustainability debate. Repairing the land use practices that are allowed to occur here would go a long way in repairing what ails the world.

The Good (Strengths):

• There are still remnants of East Chicago’s heyday. I live in one such place, across from Washington Park, which was originally designed by Jens Jensen, with a greenhouse.
• Good recreation facilities including an old minor league baseball stadium
• There are still remnants of great talent and people of good intention. We have families whose tenure goes back to the 1920’s, but they are becoming fewer.
• Faith Based Organizations. As a port of entry community East Chicago has always been known for its churches. Today most of the remaining talent are associated with faith based organization.
• Lakefront: although it is highly impaired, it is a repairable asset
• Riverfront: although, again, highly impaired the riverfront could become the cities strongest natural asset and provide a way to knit the neighborhoods together with bike paths. Includes access to the dupont prairies and another parcel (~200 acres) of untouched land right in the middle of east chicago (with Praxair to the east, the canal to the west, the CSX rail line to the south and a tank farm to the north).
• Industry continues to play an important role in this community. We just need to raise their environmental performance to a minimum level that is compatible with a sustainable community. Industry is also a link to our past history.
• Historic Landmarks: including industrial housing communities such as Marktown and Sunnyside, and an array of other buildings. We just have to stop the Mayor from demolitioning them.
• Proximity to Chicago. Despite our proximity, if East Chicago does not have fluid access to Chicago, it might as well be hundreds of miles away.
• Opportunities for a downtown commuter rail system, with direct access to Chicago.

In my mind no project ought to move forward in this community if it doesn’t address the challenges we clearly face and/or build the capacity of our strengths. This is the position I took when the BP project was first considered and I hold to it today. So how is it that East Chicago can be the recipient of a $3.8 billion investment by BP and NOT receive any of the benefits to address our obvious impairments (while spreading the wage and economic development benefits to middle-class communities in the southern part of the county)? Under this scenario why would a poor blighted community like East Chicago provide BP with a $165 million dollar tax abatement?

UPDATE:

Added video tour.

Thomas Case Studies, East Chicago

Thomas East Chicago

data source: [ Indiana BeachGuard System ]

For the past seven summers our family has been going to Whilhala beach in Whiting for an evening walk or a swim. This summer we got a pool and the weather has been too cool so we haven’t gone until Tuesday. On Tuesday the kids and I decided to go for a nice end of the day swim in the lake after swimming all day in the pool. When we got to the beach we found they had changed their policies and closed the beach area at 6 pm. We couldn’t even take a walk. The kids were disappointed, not only could they not go swimming that evening, but something they have always taken for granted suddenly came to an end. My answer to their cries at that moment was to agree with them - it wasn’t right and I didn’t understand why they closed the beach, but to make it up to them I promised to take them to Indiana Dunes the next day - Thursday.

Map of the Region

Later that evening I found this article in the NWTimes “Vandalism prompts partial closing of Whihala Beach”

photo source: John Luke, the Times

Increased gang activity has forced the county to close the Hammond side of Whihala Beach until further notice, a Lake County parks official said Tuesday.

The following day the kids and I got up and prepared for a day at the Dunes. When we got to the park, they were eager to get into the water. I slowed them down a bit by diverting their attention to hiking first.

This is perhaps my favorite view of Lake Michigan from its southern shores. From here you can imagine the beauty that once was throughout this spectacular region.

Once the kids made their way to the beach they were in the water immediately. Unfortunately, it was no more than 5 minutes later that a voice announced that all swimmers had to come out of the water - the water was too polluted for their safety. I could see the frustration race across Marta’s face. Moments before this video she was in tears.

I could not be more disappointed in my community leaders. I am tired of fighting to stop them from ignoring the problems, problems for which they are directly responsible and from which they benefit.

When we got home I realized I had forgotten to ask for a refund, and I found this frontpage article in the Post -Tribune “Local beaches perform poorly in water tests”

The Testing the Waters report, released Wednesday by the National Resources Defense Council, shows that beaches in Lake, Porter and LaPorte counties had advisories for bacteria or were closed because of bacteria 333 times in 2008, a 56 percent increase from the 213 events in 2007.

That’s up from 111 advisories and closings in 2006.

Overall, 18 percent of the beach samples taken in Indiana last year had bacteria levels higher than the recommended levels. That put the state 28th of the 32 states tested. The report includes samples from any coastal, bay or Great Lakes state.

And then there was this little nugget from Tom Anderson the Director of the Safe the Dunes Council.

Anderson said not knowing the source of the pollutants makes it hard for local officials and groups to fight the problem.

“It’s like where should we focus something if we don’t know where it’s coming from?” Anderson said.

He called for source testing to be included in the study, but that has its own problems. The federal act that requires the testing does not provide funding for source testing, said Amber Finkelstein, a public information officer for the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.

Low-cost solutions for bringing down bacteria levels are available, however, Anderson said. He pointed to Michigan City, which recently prohibited people from feeding birds and bought lids for garbage cans.

<Public Disclosure>

It might be prudent here to mention that “Save the Dunes” recently received a large grant from BP. Oh, and may be I ought to mention that Tom Anderson serves on the Indiana Air pollution Control Board. The same board that recently re-designated Northwest Indiana from a Non-attainment zone to an attainment zone for Sulfur Dioxide. It may also be important to know that BP is presently retooling its Whiting refinery to process the high sulfur product coming out of the Alberta Tar Sands. Anyhow, I always thought Tom meant well.

</Public Disclosure>

Knowing that the water current flows counter clockwise in Lake Michigan, it is not hard to imagine who the source could be, especially with such acutely high levels of bacteria over 600/100ml.

Two views of Burns Harbor: 1) Looking west from the Indiana Dunes State Park, and 2) satellite image

Then there is this very glaring problem. I suppose most communities would have dealt with this in a previous era. Yes that is a known contaminated creek flushing right into the middle of the state beach. When it reaches the lake IDEM expects that “Dilution will be the Solution” to keep bathers safe. We wouldn’t have it any other way in Northwest Indiana. Do you suppose this could have a negative effect on tourism?

Via Save the Dunes [ Dunes Creek Watershed ]

The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) report “Testing the Waters 2009” tends to take a national perspective when it comes to the problem of identifying the main sources of pollution causing the beach closings. Nationally “Runoff” accounts for 36% of the sources of pollution, with 62% as unknown. However, in Indiana 99% of the source of contamination is considered “unknown.” In my mind this is a criminal disregard for the health of the public.  The same “unknown” used to defend the largest landowners with the greatest intensive uses on Indiana’s Urban Lake Front.

More than 90% of our urban Lakefront is owned by three large industries; BP Whiting - the largest oil refinery in the Midwest, Arcelormittal - the largest integrated Steel Mill in the Country, and U.S. Steel - the second largest Steel Mill. Additionally the big three own the majority rights to our air and watersheds. If there is a major environmental problem, you can generally point to them as the source. They are also effective at using the marginal effects of non-point source pollution such as surface runoff and vehicular pollution to offset criticisms of their discharges. IDEM repeats these same constructed arguments. Granted runoff is a large contributor to the problem, but we also know from whom the contaminants are running.

View of Shoreline Industries from the breakwall at the Hammond Marina

IDEM regulates both industrial and municipal discharges. The cities are not with out fault. They have yet to separate storm water from their sewage systems which contributes to the surface runoff problem. To know the source is easy, to not - is to ignore the problem.

It doesn’t hurt industries interests that the Commissioner of IDEM is Tom Easterly, the environmental Director for Bethlehem Steel (now owned by ArcelorMittal) and Nisource, and who once told a table of Great Lake Commissioners over lunch that:

<LOL>

“there is no need for recreation or commercial fishing in the Great Lakes because there were never any natural fisheries here. The Great Lakes are no better than stocked ponds.”

</LOL>

With one of the highest concentrations of heavy industries in the country, It follows that Indiana’s urban Lake front would also see some of the highest levels of pollution. And in fact the data bares this out. Not only do we know that the indiana Harbor Shipping Canal is the most polluted waterway in the country, but according to the NRDC Study “Testing the Waters 2008″ East Chicago’s Jeorse Park Beach ranks third in the nation, and first in Great Lakes, for exceeding Daily National Standards. The geographical center of BP, Mittal and US Steel is East Chicago’s Joerse Park Beach. This make Joerse Park Beach ground zero for some of the highest levels of pollutants in beach waters in the country.

<Clearing the Waters>

The source of pollution is ignorance and we know who the agents of ignorance are. They are self interested community and industrial leaders, who like to pretend that the problems stem from decisions made by “the public.” The source of our pollution is the same as the source of our public corruption. They go hand in hand. The only difference is that the private actors in this dance do not go to jail.

</Clearing the Waters>

- Now, off to the Michigan Dunes

Thomas East Chicago, Environment, View of Lake Michigan

via [ www.liquidassets.psu.edu ] 

This evening I happened to click on the East Chicago Public Government Channel which for all purposes has been the Mayor’s personal campaign channel. But to my enormous surprise this evening they were running this wonderful documentary “Liquid Assets.” I don’t know who coordinated the broadcast, but I was thrilled to see something of real substance and value to the community on the channel. Very Good.  

Liquid Assets is a public media and outreach initiative that seeks to inform the nation about the critical role that our water infrastructure plays in protecting public health and promoting economic prosperity.

Combining a ninety-minute documentary with a community toolkit for facilitating local involvement, Liquid Assets explores the history, engineering, and political and economic challenges of our water infrastructure, and engages communities in local discussion about public water and wastewater issues.

Thomas Adaptive Reuse, Case Studies, East Chicago, The Water I Drink