Search Results for '10 min readings'
LIVING NEXT TO A WAR FACTORY
Neighbors of closed Aerojet plant worry about their health and water
By Michael Collins
LA Weekly – May 11, 2000
Fred Sharp thought it was funny the time his son brought home 20 rounds of machine-gun ammo he had found in his Chino Hills neighborhood. But Sharp, a Vietnam vet and bomb expert, was less amused on March [...]
RUSSIANS, ROCKETS AND THE SANTA ANA RIVER
A closed weapons plant in the Chino Hills may be leaking hazardous chemicals into the Santa Ana River.
By Michael Collins
Orange County Weekly – May 18, 2000
Fred Sharp thought it was funny the time his son brought home 20 rounds of machine-gun ammo he had found in his Chino Hills neighborhood. But Sharp, a Vietnam vet [...]
ROCKETDYNE RANCH
The battle over the massive Ahmanson Ranch housing development heats up amid growing concerns about possible water and soil contamination from nearby Rocketdyne.
By Michael Collins
Ventura County Reporter – December 12, 2002
July 1959. Eastern Ventura County. Simi Valley folks squirmed uncomfortably in their chairs as they watched their flickering black and white television sets. They stared in nervous [...]
REAL HOT PROPERTY
A popular Brentwood dog park on Veterans Administration property is build over an old radioactive waste dump that may soon be unearthed by proposed development.
by Michael Collins
EnviroReporter.com – May 18, 2006
SUVs and luxury sedans glide into the Barrington Dog Park parking lot just south of Sunset Boulevard in Brentwood. Industry types and soccer moms chatter [...]
WHICH WAY THE WIND BLOWS
Runkle Canyon is poised to be Simi Valley’s newest neighborhood. But did the city misinterpret the risk of radioactive material in the ground?
By Michael Collins
Ventura County Reporter – March 17, 2005
Cattle graze on verdant hills as winter winds whip through the branches of centuries-old oaks on Runkle Canyon. Shrubby mulefat and willow scrub sway in [...]
SPIN CYCLE – LA CityBeat
Selling Runkle Canyon pollution report as clean
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat – August 23, 2007
The headlines out of Ventura County last week must have pleased Simi Valley officials intent on convincing its citizenry of the benign nature of Runkle Canyon’s soil and water. This is where homebuilding giants KB Home and Lennar are intent on [...]
HOT ZONE
Rocketdyne’s Simi Valley Field Laboratory was on the frontlines of the Cold War. Now some who lived near “The Hill” say they share two distinctions: chronic illness and the unswerving belief that the lab caused it
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles magazine – June 1998
ON A HOT JULY NIGHT IN 1959, on flickering RCAs and Philcos and [...]
HOT PROPERTY
Runkle Canyon developers claim mysterious new state tests have erased previously high levels of Radioactive contamination
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles ValleyBeat – January 19, 2006
Much like Ahmanson Ranch, the huge housing development planned near the Los Angeles County border with Ventura that was instead turned into a park, proposed construction at Runkle Canyon faces its own [...]
NEIGHBORHOOD THREAT – Annotated
Runkle Canyon is poised to be Simi Valley’s newest neighborhood. But did the city misinterpret the risk of radioactive material in the ground?
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – March 10, 2005
Cattle graze on verdant hills as winter winds whip through the branches of centuries-old oaks on Runkle Canyon. Shrubby mulefat and willow scrub sway in [...]
Runkle Canyon EIR Analysis
Residents contend that the Runkle Canyon Environmental Impact Report (EIR) appears to be flawed for a number of reasons including those reported on by Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat and EnviroReporter.com, and because of new developments analyzed here. Not only were high strontium-90 findings in Runkle Canyon omitted or mischaracterized in the EIR, the actual 2003 Miller Brooks environmental [...]
HOT PROPERTY – Annotated
Runkle Canyon developers claim mysterious new state tests have erased previously high levels of radioactive contamination
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles ValleyBeat – January 19, 2006
Much like Ahmanson Ranch, the huge housing development planned near the Los Angeles County border with Ventura that was instead turned into a park, proposed construction at Runkle Canyon faces its own [...]
Entire Pat-Chem Laboratories report
Recent articles in the Ventura County Star and the Simi Valley Acorn, and comments by City of Simi Valley officials, have misrepresented the pollution problems in Runkle Canyon and our role in reporting them. In order to correct the record, and to continue to provide the citizens of the Simi and San Fernando valleys the [...]
BUBBLE TROUBLE
City of Simi Valley forced to test Runkle Canyon water and soil for arsenic
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – July 26, 2007
No sooner had Simi Valley’s cadre of concerned citizens, the Radiation Rangers, discovered that arsenic and other heavy metals were fouling the water and soil of Runkle Canyon than the knives came out. The [...]
Simi Valley City Council Excerpts – October 22, 2007
The Ventura County Reporter cover story “Dirty Business – New law cleaning up Rocketdyne for parkland may not stop adjacent KB Home development pushed by Simi Valley City Council” included quotes culled from these selected excerpts.
The speakers, who were limited to three minutes apiece in public comment, included “Toxic Terry” Matheney and “The Good Reverend John” [...]
DIRTY BUSINESS
New law cleaning up Rocketdyne for parkland may not stop adjacent KB Home development pushed by Simi Valley City Council
By Michael Collins
Ventura County Reporter – November 1, 2007
The apocalyptic Ranch Fire marching toward Simi Valley Oct. 22 never made it to the city limits, but smoky wind gusts up to 70 mph heralded the firestorm [...]
MILLION DOLLAR MAYBE
VA commits to further Brentwood nuke dump study, though uncertainty remains
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat – September 13, 2007
A full-blown $1 million study of a forgotten biomedical nuclear waste site in Brentwood will be done to more fully explore concerns raised in a preliminary report, it was revealed last week during a Department of Veterans [...]
DOWN THE TEST TUBES
KB Home’s Runkle Canyon radiation tests questioned as more groundwater pollution is found and developer negotiates cleanup agreement with state
By Michael Collins
Ventura County Reporter – January 17, 2008
As soon as the Rev. John Southwick heard the latest round of Runkle Canyon soil testing for the leukemia-causing radionuclide strontium-90 (Sr-90) came back low, he started to question [...]
SPIN CYCLE
Selling Runkle Canyon pollution report as clean
By Michael Collins
Ventura County Reporter – August 23, 2007
The headlines out of Ventura County last week must have pleased Simi Valley officials intent on convincing its citizenry of the benign nature of Runkle Canyon’s soil and water. This is where homebuilding giants KB Home and Lennar are intent on [...]
Runkle Canyon Chromium
EnviroReporter.com analysis – June 2008
MARCH 2008 ROCK SAMPLE WITH WHITE EVAPORATE
A mysterious white evaporate or precipitate was found in Runkle Canyon by Rev. John Southwick and Frank Serafine on March 26, 2008 and given the next night to Norm Riley, Rocketdyne cleanup Project Manager for Cal-EPA’s Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) which subsequently tested [...]
BLINDED BY THE LIGHT
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – July 22, 2004
The following new readings were recently taken from test sites on the Rocketdyne property. The devil is in the details.
B-1 jet testing area:
- solvent (PCE) in soils – 2,000 parts per billion (ppb)
- solvent (PCE) in soil gas – 3,400 ppb
IEL: Instrument/equipment lab:
- primarily solvents with highest [...]
TWO MILE ISLAND
The Rocketdyne facility is more poisoned than anyone knew. Now residents and community leaders of the northwest San Fernando Valley and Ventura County supervisors want more testing before new homes get any closer.
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – July 22, 2004
“I didn’t know anything when I worked up at Rocketdyne, I just didn’t know anything,” [...]
THE RADIATION RANGERS
Developers of Simi Valley’s Runkle Canyon claim the water tested clean. Then a band of citizens discovered super-toxic goo seeping from the ground
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – June 21, 2007
The sweating point man leads a small group up the dusty inclines of Runkle Canyon. This undeveloped swath of chaparral near the town of Simi [...]
PAY DIRT
Gov. Schwarzenegger signs Kuehl bill to clean up Rocketdyne to Superfund standards; Boeing agrees to pay for remediation and donate lab to State for parkland
EnviroReporter.com — October 13, 2007
By Michael Collins
A decades-long battle over Boeing’s massive Santa Susana Field Laboratory came to a historic climax on Friday as California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed legislation that [...]
NEIGHBORHOOD THREAT
Runkle Canyon is poised to be Simi Valley’s newest neighborhood. But did the city misinterpret the risk of radioactive material in the ground?
By Michael Collins
Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – March 10, 2005
Cattle graze on verdant hills as winter winds whip through the branches of centuries-old oaks on Runkle Canyon. Shrubby mulefat and willow scrub sway in [...]
Critical Runkle Canyon documents
This timeline presents an analysis of information generated by licensed laboratories that should trip DTSC guidelines to precipitate further soil, surface water and subsurface water testing in Runkle Canyon. This information was submitted to DTSC on July 3, 2008.
* A small flag on the bottom represents an event that can’t be seen with the current [...]
