File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1998/marxism-general.9803, message 15


Date: Sun, 08 Mar 1998 11:08:19 -0500
From: Louis Proyect <lnp3-AT-columbia.edu>
Subject: Re: M-G: A demagogic, reactionary "Action Alert"


Rolf Martens:
>No, it doesn't. If the US government had planned such storage
>of wastes of this kind that would have endangered people in
>some way, then protests against this of course would have been
>just and necessary.

WASTE HAULERS DISCOVER A PLACE TO BUILD DUMPS  AND INCINERATORS WHERE
REGULATIONS ARE OFTEN LAX

The nation's waste hauling firms--BFI, Waste Management, Inc., and
others--have discovered many new places to dump: America's 300 Indian
reservations. Conditions there are perfect: the Indians are almost
universally poor; unemployment is 50% or more; the federal government does
not have jurisdiction; state governments do not have jurisdiction; and the
local people often lack access to scientific and technical advice. Under
these conditions, promises and a little cash can go a long way.

"Non-Indian entities are using cash and poverty politics on the
reservations to make us once again a dumping grounds," says Suzan Harjo of
the National Congress of American Indians in Washington, DC.

Six months ago Waste Management, Inc., approached the Gila River Indian
Community in Arizona, hoping to establish a 640-acre landfill on the
Indians' 372,000-acre reservation. They flew tribal officials to Chicago to
visit their Oak Brook home office where chemists in white coats give the
impression that Waste Management is something besides a garbage company.
Waste Management promised the Indians annual revenues of $10 million--a
staggering sum of money for an impoverished desert people.

The tribe ultimately turned down the offer. "I would say that probably was
the most difficult decision that this council had when they looked at the
proposition," says William T. Talbow, director of the Community's physical
resources department. Mr. Talbow says his people are now considering
proposals to build a large waste incinerator to generate power.

Rita Lavelle, the former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
official who served a prison term for lying to Congress in connection with
the Stringfellow Acid Pits near Riverside, California, is now peddling her
services as an independent waste consultant to Indians and others. She
recently told the Los Angeles Times (September 26, pg. 1) that she has been
asked by more than 20 Indian tribes in recent months to help them evaluate
waste processing proposals. She said she had recommended against almost all
of them because the proposals involved "bad technologies."

Even some people in the waste hauling business are speaking out, cautioning
the Indians to be careful. John Schofield, senior vice president of
International Technologies (IT) Corp., a major waste processing company,
says, "Indian tribes need to be cautioned against individuals looking for
that fast buck. Quite frankly, there have been a lot of people in this
business who have not acted honorably. There are good guys, but there are
an awful lot of bad guys around."

BFI (Browning-Ferris Industries) of Houston, Texas, has wooed the Cherokees
in North Carolina (unsuccessfully) and more recently the Fort Mohave tribe
on a reservation that straddles parts of California, Nevada and Arizona.

"They flew some of us [to Texas] out on a private jet, took us to their
private country club... put us up in the best hotels," says Nora Garcia,
tribal chairwoman. "We were told it would provide a lot of jobs and good
revenues for the tribe.

"Then they showed us what we'd be involved in. It was devastating to stand
on the edge of huge holes in the ground five football fields wide with...
chemicals and oils." The Fort Mojave community ultimately turned down BFI's
offer.

In 1979 the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the U.S. agency with trust
responsibility for Indian nations, built a municipal solid waste landfill
in Parker, Arizona, on sovereign land owned by the Colorado River Indian
tribes. In 1984 a southern California waste hauler persuaded the tribe to
accept wastes that would have been considered "hazardous" under California
law. The waste is shredded automobiles, which are loaded with lead, zinc,
cadmium, copper and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). The Parker landfill
charges $75 for dumping a 20-ton load. The same load dumped at a hazardous
waste landfill in California would cost $1600 or more. The tribe makes
$127,000 annually from the operation and the hauler is happy: "There's no
red tape there," says Roger Bejarano. "It's so much easier to start an
operation on these lands," he says.

The federal Indian Health Service was supposed to inspect the Parker
landfill at least once a year to make sure it wasn't becoming a hazard to
the Indians. But they haven't done it. "We haven't been, I guess, as
diligent in meeting that responsibility as perhaps we should have been,"
says Dean Jackson of the Indian Health Service. Still, he says, the Health
Service's role is strictly advisory. "We have no badge. We have no
regulatory authority."

Dick Agajanian, owner of the salvage firm that hauls waste across the
Mohave desert from California to Parker, says his customers have difficulty
refusing the offers he makes them: cut-rate dumping, no red tape, and
everything legal. His list of customers is growing. He recently added to
his list the California Department of Transportation, the U.S. Forest
Service, and the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. "It is the difference between
spending $100,000 a year and $500,000 a year on disposal," says Douglas
Shaw, vice-president and general counsel for the Federal Reserve in San
Francisco.

The LOS ANGELES TIMES says there's a "new land rush" on with waste haulers
proposing dumps, incinerators and waste processing facilities on Indian
lands. Though their lands are held in trust for them by the U.S.
government, Indians negotiate directly with waste haulers and are free to
cut their own deals.

"The Indian is more trusting than the non-Indian," says Conner Byestewa,
Jr., environmental protection officer for the Colorado River Indian tribes.
"We just have to hope that our negotiations and business deals are good
ones." He adds, "You never have real security."

Two months after the Parker landfill began accepting industrial waste from
California, a fire broke out in the auto shredder waste, sending a thick
plume of black smoke over the town that residents said smelled like burning
plastic. An EPA report said, "If the waste contained PCB, then dioxins
would be left as residue [from the fire]."

Tribal attorney Pam Williams says, "If mistakes are made, if advantages are
taken of the tribes, it's not for our lack of commitment." But, she adds,
"I agree the tribe has to be vigilant and probably has to be paranoid."

                                                 --Peter Montague
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                                 --Peter Montague, Editor
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