Exclusive 2019 Update: VICTORY AT THE VA – West LA Veterans Administration master plan protects old nuclear dump from development 2019 EnviroReporter.com Comments on West LA VA Master Plan Environmental Impact Statement February 13, 2019 Michael Collins breaks down all that is wrong with the West LA VA Master Plan […]

Read the Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat “Street” article on the Simi Valley City Council temporarily halting KB Homes grading plans for Runkle Canyon, and asking the U.S. EPA, California Department of Health Services, and the California Department of Toxic Substances Control to evaluate our revelations that the development area has tested […]

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 […]

2000-2024 Aerojet Rocketdyne Chino Hills Investigation Main Page “Perchlorate draining off Aerojet Chino Hills” – October 26, 2017 Surface and subsurface water tests ordered by DTSC in response to EnviroReporter.com comments finds high perchlorate, explosive RDX and uranium. DTSC notifies no one about it.   “Dead for the Hills” – […]

A new report on L.A.’s nuked Rocketdyne site finally catches the attention of mainstream media By Michael Collins Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat — October 12, 2006 A new five-year study of Boeing’s monstrously contaminated Santa Susana Field Laboratory (SSFL) sparked unprecedented mainstream print, radio, and television coverage last week. “Study Says […]

Rocketdyne’s Santa Susana 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 […]

by Michael Collins Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – September 28, 2006 Dozens of exasperated residents converged on Simi Valley City Hall Monday night, spurred on by last week’s report in this paper (“The Hills Have Eyes”), and worried the development of 461 homes in Runkle Canyon was being pushed through without […]

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, […]

Simi Valley residents unite to fight ‘hot’ KB Home development in Runkle Canyon By Michael Collins Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – September 21, 2006 “I am not a tree hugger, an environmental activist, or an Erin Brockovich wannabe,” said Patricia Coryell before an August 21 meeting of the Simi Valley City […]

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 […]

How investigative reporting stopped a public health disaster By Dean Kuipers Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – December 31, 2003 June 13, 2002: Collins writes “Earthly Secrets” for LA Weekly, questioning what was in the water and soil of Ahmanson Ranch which is owned by Washington Mutual. Late June 2002: Residents hold […]

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 […]

The Runkle Canyon 2004 Final Environmental Impact Report (FEIR) has a much lower set of numbers than the 2002 Draft EIR for estimated fugitive dust that will escape the Runkle Canyon site during construction. There is no explanation given for these drastically-reduced numbers which lower the amount of dust estimated […]

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, […]

Simi Valley city and citizens are still looking for answers about Runkle Canyon radiation By Michael Collins Los Angeles CityBeat/ValleyBeat – March 15, 2007 Last fall, spurred on by citizens alarmed at the impending development of picturesque Runkle Canyon and the cloud of strontium-90-laden dust it could launch over the […]

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 […]