On Tuesday night in the Town of Niagara, the state Department of Environmental Conservation held a tabling session for residents to ask questions about their ongoing radiological assessment. However, not everyone who attended feels they got the answers they were looking for.
"There's not a lot of clear answers, to be honest with you," town of Niagara resident Jen Fisch told BTPM News outside the tabling event.
Fisch left the DEC’s Niagara and Erie County Radiological Assessment, or NECRA, tabling session feeling frustrated.
She lives near Gill Creek in the Town of Niagara. According to her, both the DEC and the federal Environmental Protection Agency have been out to sample her property. She said radiation has been found on part of her property, but she’s still in a waiting game with the EPA for additional results. She was hoping the DEC could tell her more about how far the radiation extends.
"I was just looking for some additional information based on where the radiation is with my property and where my home is. My home and the radiation are a little further away, so I've been trying to get help with that. And there's really nothing," Fisch said. "We're asking for relocation, but based on where the radiation is and the location to my house is in the front of the property, they don't want to give me anything."
She said while she knows some samples have come back as radioactive, she hasn't been able to find out where the samples were taken from or how elevated the samples were.
"All we hear is 'it's elevated,' but as opposed to [what]? Elevated could mean anything. Elevated to where we can't touch it, or elevated to where we're kind of OK? But elevated, it's just elevated?" Fisch said.
DEC Region 9 Acting Director Chad Staniszewski was on-site at the tabling event. He said the radiological evaluation across Erie and Niagara counties has been a challenge because of the size.
"It's really just the vastness of the area that we studied, as well as the amount of data that was collected," Staniszewski said. "We're way over 2 million data points that have been collected so far during this investigation, and that increases every day."
He said he understands the anxiety people feel and encourages residents with concerns to reach out to the DEC.
"We understand that this creates a lot of anxiety for people, right? Radiological contamination, you can't taste it, you can't smell it, right?" Staniszewski said. "It's new for a lot of people, and it's difficult for them to really understand what the risks are. I want people to know that we are working very diligently to make sure that we are being fully protective of the environment and peoples' health."
For Fisch, she did not feel she got the answers she needed.
"Disgruntled," Fisch said on her feelings leaving the session. "There's no answers. Nothing. You're just talking [in] a circle."
Staniszewski said there is not have another tabling event planned, but that could change. Anyone with concerns or questions should reach out to the NECRA hotline at (844) 612-8144 or email NECRA@dec.ny.gov.
