EPA wants community's two cents EPA wants community's two cents (December 19, 2003)

Interviews could help set policy for TCE cleanup

By Grace Rauh

David Cooper is hoping that Mountain View residents talk his ear off next year.

As the Environmental Protection Agency's local community involvement coordinator, Cooper will be conducting interviews in February and March to get feedback and hear concerns from residents surrounding the cleanup of sites contaminated by trichloroethene (TCE) in northeast Mountain View.

The interviews will help Cooper review and make changes to the way he and the EPA conduct business and communicate with people who live on or near the contaminated sites.

"In order for the plan to be most effective, you want to check in with folks and make sure you actually are meeting their needs," Cooper said.

He hopes to conduct between 20 and 30 interviews and plans to hear from a cross-section of concerned parties that will include residents, city officials and staff, reporters who have covered the cleanup and Northeast Mountain View Advisory Council (NMAC) members.

"The purpose is not to conduct a scientific study," Cooper said, but to collect a broad range of feedback. Residents on the EPA mailing list will be formally notified about the interviews in January. Responding to Cooper's call will not guarantee an interview with the EPA. He is able to conduct a limited number of interviews, but welcomes community feedback year-round, he said.

NMAC board member Ed Schlosser is certain that residents will be receptive to the interview invitation.

"I'm sure we'll get many people to volunteer," Schlosser said.

The EPA is also beginning to review the past five years of cleanup in northeast Mountain View. Project manager Alana Lee will also be looking for feedback from the community regarding the clean-up process.

If the clean-up site happens to be fenced in, and kids were climbing the fence, Lee wants to know. And around the site, "if there were smells that people were smelling, she would want to know that," Cooper said.

Cooper can be reached at (415) 972-3237 or cooper.david@epa.gov. Lee can be reached at (415) 972-3141 or lee.alana@epa.gov.

E-mail Grace Rauh at grauh@mv-voice.com

E-mail a friend a link to this story.