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Real Hot Property
Page 11 of 20
Page 11 of 20
“The matter of precedence is also worthy of consideration,” Book continued. “If for
some reason we were to place restrictions on future use of this property or if we
should require corrective actions before its release, then we should follow the same
requirements for all other such locations. Logically, we would be compelled to search
out all other such locations and place similar requirements on those properties. This,
we believe is impractical and totally unnecessary. We recommend that the property
at the Veterans Hospital in Los Angeles be released with no restrictions on its future
use.”
Thirteen years after this statement was made, one of the “other such locations,” the
UC Davis nuke dog dump, was discovered to be so hot as to make it a Superfund
site. A Superfund site is any land in the United States that has been contaminated by
hazardous waste and identified by the U.S.-EPA as a candidate for cleanup because
it poses a risk to human health and/or the environment. It is the worst of the worst.
On May 7, 1981, five NRC inspectors went to the Brentwood dump site and did a 45-
minute walking inspection with two gamma detectors and picked up nothing but
background measurements. They noted that 20 – 30 feet of “fill material and dirt”
had been added to the burial sites and “there were no radioactive materials
detected.”
“That’s not going to tell you anything,” Joseph Karbus, head of the Radiological
Health Unit of the LA County Health Department, said at the time regarding Geiger
Muller counter inspection of the dump. “You have to go down and take a core sample
to find out anything.”
The NRC released its assessment of the site on August 5, 1981 and called it clean
while mischaracterizing the amounts of the most prevalent radionuclides. The report
also noted that the LA Department of Water and Power had collected five water
samples from five adjacent wells used to supply Santa Monica and that the “results
indicate no levels of unsatisfactory radioactive contaminations in accordance with
acceptable levels defined in the Safe Drinking Water Act.”
This wasn’t true. One sample tested high enough in alpha radiation in April 1981 to
trip a law-mandated characterization of the well. This was never done though the law,
which is part of the California Code of Regulations – Title 22, had been on the books
since 1979. A high alpha reading suggests an unnatural source for the radioactivity,
possibly from the dump, which could be very dangerous considering what’s already
known to be in it. The well, which had been in operation since 1928, was closed in
1996 due to chemical contamination not connected to possible offsite radioactive
contamination from the Brentwood VA dump.
By the end of August 1981, the NRC assured Beilenson and Braude that all was
okay. “The risk from any radioactive material at this location is vanishingly small and
should not be a factor in any decision regarding future use of this property.”
Beilenson couldn’t have been happier. “Without the assistance of the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission, the park concept would have been totally abandoned,”
Beilenson wrote to the commission September 14. “The NRC is to be commended for
its efforts to educate the public regarding the safety of radioactive materials which
were buried in the proposed park site.”
some reason we were to place restrictions on future use of this property or if we
should require corrective actions before its release, then we should follow the same
requirements for all other such locations. Logically, we would be compelled to search
out all other such locations and place similar requirements on those properties. This,
we believe is impractical and totally unnecessary. We recommend that the property
at the Veterans Hospital in Los Angeles be released with no restrictions on its future
use.”
Thirteen years after this statement was made, one of the “other such locations,” the
UC Davis nuke dog dump, was discovered to be so hot as to make it a Superfund
site. A Superfund site is any land in the United States that has been contaminated by
hazardous waste and identified by the U.S.-EPA as a candidate for cleanup because
it poses a risk to human health and/or the environment. It is the worst of the worst.
On May 7, 1981, five NRC inspectors went to the Brentwood dump site and did a 45-
minute walking inspection with two gamma detectors and picked up nothing but
background measurements. They noted that 20 – 30 feet of “fill material and dirt”
had been added to the burial sites and “there were no radioactive materials
detected.”
“That’s not going to tell you anything,” Joseph Karbus, head of the Radiological
Health Unit of the LA County Health Department, said at the time regarding Geiger
Muller counter inspection of the dump. “You have to go down and take a core sample
to find out anything.”
The NRC released its assessment of the site on August 5, 1981 and called it clean
while mischaracterizing the amounts of the most prevalent radionuclides. The report
also noted that the LA Department of Water and Power had collected five water
samples from five adjacent wells used to supply Santa Monica and that the “results
indicate no levels of unsatisfactory radioactive contaminations in accordance with
acceptable levels defined in the Safe Drinking Water Act.”
This wasn’t true. One sample tested high enough in alpha radiation in April 1981 to
trip a law-mandated characterization of the well. This was never done though the law,
which is part of the California Code of Regulations – Title 22, had been on the books
since 1979. A high alpha reading suggests an unnatural source for the radioactivity,
possibly from the dump, which could be very dangerous considering what’s already
known to be in it. The well, which had been in operation since 1928, was closed in
1996 due to chemical contamination not connected to possible offsite radioactive
contamination from the Brentwood VA dump.
By the end of August 1981, the NRC assured Beilenson and Braude that all was
okay. “The risk from any radioactive material at this location is vanishingly small and
should not be a factor in any decision regarding future use of this property.”
Beilenson couldn’t have been happier. “Without the assistance of the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission, the park concept would have been totally abandoned,”
Beilenson wrote to the commission September 14. “The NRC is to be commended for
its efforts to educate the public regarding the safety of radioactive materials which
were buried in the proposed park site.”
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| Welcome to EnviroReporter.com! |
Michael Collins debuts this
website with a comprehensive
investigation of a nuclear dump in
Brentwood, California. This is a
longer version of the cover story
currently in LA CityBeat. Check
the paper and this website for
updates!
website with a comprehensive
investigation of a nuclear dump in
Brentwood, California. This is a
longer version of the cover story
currently in LA CityBeat. Check
the paper and this website for
updates!
