Hat trip to Irvine Community News & Views for this story that documents evidence that dangerous toxic waste has been uncovered during the construction of Irvine’s new Portola High School in the city’s Northeast corridor near the Musick Jail site.
The piece, written by Harvey Liss, carefully documents the materials discovered through a series of public records requests and Freedom of Information Act requests. Liss, who has a PhD and is a licensed civil engineer, did a masterful job of documenting what happened, what was found and what the harmful effects of these materials could have on our kids and Portoloa High School teachers in the years ahead.
There are those are going to dismiss any story in this publication as a partisan hack job due to Larry Agran’s association with its production. And still others will dismiss Liss for his personal association with Agran. But I challenge those at the district office or the IUSD board of trustees to respond or refute some of the facts Liss has uncovered.
From the story:
According to records recently obtained by Irvine Community News & Views, evidence continues to mount suggesting that toxic contamination at the 40-acre High School site (“Site A”) — and on nearby property — may portend a significant health and safety risk to the thousands of students who will be attending Portola High. The risk is even greater to the teachers and staff who may be working there for 20, 30 or even 40 years.
These risks are known to the School District. Yet, IUSD officials have continued to rush construction of the High School, while concealing important information from the public. In fact, IUSD officials failed to publicly disclose the November 2014 discovery of dangerous toxic contamination, until forced to do so by a Public Records Act request from this reporter.
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Last November, workers were digging a long trench to install a huge boxed concrete storm drain to serve the school and thousands of new homes yet to be built in the northern reaches of Irvine. The official reports obtained under the California Public Records Act reveal that on November 13th, workers operating earthmoving equipment encountered, at a depth of 16 feet, an unusually strong odor and discolored soil — two red flags for possible toxic contamination. In accordance with State law and regulations, work was stopped. Then higher-ups were notified, and probing of the contaminated soil continued for 100 feet until apparently clean soil was found.
It soon became evident to workers on site, and presumably to school officials as well, that this was no small spill or “stain,” as later described by environmental consultants for the School District. An email later revealed that the contaminated soil stretched 29 feet onto the Portola High School site; and the contamination permeated the soil to a depth of between 15 feet and 28 feet. By the time all the suspect soil was removed for testing and disposal, the true extent of the “stained soil” hauled away amounted to 78 truckloads — nearly 1,000 cubic yards.
Ordinarily, laboratory testing to determine levels of toxins and carcinogens (cancer-causing agents) in soil samples is a straightforward process completed in a matter of days. Yet in the days and weeks after the initial discovery of potentially dangerous and toxic contamination, no test results were provided to the public. No press releases were issued. No newspaper stories appeared. It was as though the worrisome discovery had never happened.
Except it did happen. Tests were performed, but the results remained a secret, hidden from the public. Finally, in response to a citizen’s January 27, 2015 Public Records Act request, on February 10th — three months after the initial discovery of what had been described simply as “stained soil” containing “non-hazardous petroleum hydrocarbons” — 245 pages of documents were released by School District officials, including dozens of pages of test data.
The findings? There were significant and often remarkably high levels of hazardous petrochemicals — some levels were far beyond the “maximum permissible contaminant concentration.” These included significant concentrations of various benzene derivatives, naphthalenes, and extraordinary concentrations of diesel. In addition, soil samples contained significant concentrations of heavy metals, for example: lead, chromium, cobalt and vanadium. None of these toxic and — in some cases — carcinogenic agents typically occur in the natural environment. With sufficient exposure, all of them can cause discomfort and even devastating disease — in laboratory animals and in humans.
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On November 19, 2014, IUSD staff sent an email to the School Board alerting Board members to the discovery of potentially contaminated soil that was discovered at Site A during excavation work for the storm drain along Irvine Boulevard. School Board minutes do not indicate that this matter was ever reported or discussed publicly.
TheLiberalOC contacted IUSD for comment; the district’s new PIO starts at the end of this month. No one from the district has returned our call and we’ll update this post with their response if it is provided. I’d like to know where the 78 dump truck loads were taken.
You ask about where the dirty dirt goes- a lot of stuff like this goes to places like Kern County, outside SCAQMD jurisdiction, where it can be treated and essentially decontaminated and re-used as construction fill. As for the actual matter at hand, the article provides no technical assessment of the data that was provided to the author. No connection to the previous environmental reports on the site (e.g., location of this most recent excavation relative to previous findings), no quantitative description of the actual levels of contamination in the soil, no risk assessment beyond purple prose. And the alleged cover up was so insidious and secretive and the school district so formidable and impenetrable that it took two weeks to get the documents released! Oops, now I’m lapsing into hyperbole and purple prose, I shouldn’t do that…
This is unbelievable. I read the whole article at Irvine Community News and Views and can’t believe they are letting the school go forward with all this.