May 29, 2010 in Nation/World

Congress pushes military for data on tainted water

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WASHINGTON – Angered by what they consider the military’s reticence to reveal all it knows about decades of water contamination on North Carolina Marine base Camp Lejeune, lawmakers want to force the Marine Corps and the Navy to produce an inventory of all the documentation scientists need to understand the contamination.

Senators and members of the House of Representatives have inserted language into the 2011 defense authorization bill that would require Defense Secretary Robert Gates to certify that the military has done so.

The House version of the bill gives the Defense Department 180 days to act; the Senate version offers 90 days.

For the past year, federal scientists have complained that the Marine Corps and its parent agency, the Department of the Navy, haven’t been fully open about the reams of documentation the military holds on the tainted water.

“The military stalled for three decades,” said Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina, the top Republican on the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee. “To carry out their study, (scientists) have got to have all relevant documents, and the Navy has been less than helpful at providing those.”

The dispute among Congress, the military and scientists at an obscure federal agency in Atlanta opens a window into how a behind-the-scenes battle among bureaucrats can have lasting effects on thousands of people nationwide.

Accurate science on the poisons’ effects could prove crucial in lawsuits against the U.S. government by Marines’ family members, and to veterans who are trying to receive health benefits related to their service at Camp Lejeune, N.C.

A year ago, a new discovery about benzene – a key component of gasoline – forced the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry to toss out a 10-year-old study about the water’s impact on health.

The agency, an arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is responsible for studying the health effects of major contamination sites around the country.

This winter, McClatchy Newspapers reported on documents that show that up to 800,000 gallons of fuel spilled into aquifers that fed barracks, officers’ quarters and the base’s hospital, far more than previously had been estimated.

“Every study would have changed dramatically if they’d known what the concentrations were, because the concentration of benzene would’ve been higher,” said Burr, who also sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

In March, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry wrote the military questioning whether the Pentagon had turned over everything it promised.

The Navy responded that it doesn’t have the expertise to know exactly what papers the scientists want. Military officers also said they had been completely open with the scientists.

Sen. Kay Hagan, D-N.C., co-sponsor of the Senate language, argued that the scientists shouldn’t have to go hunting for what they need.

Three comments on this story so far. Add yours!

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  usmc_wlh1975 on May 30 at 8:27 a.m.

  Thanks for posting this article and helping to keep up the pressure on the Department of the Navy and the United States Marine Corps.

  It is interesting how the Navy department claims ignorance on scientific issues when it suits them, but claims expertise enough that they should be the primary decision maker on what should be done to clean up their messes when that suits them. Anyone who believes their lies about not having the knowledge to know what evidence is required for the science to be done right should take a look at their NAVFAC engineering site.

  A quote follows:

  Naval Facilities Engineering Command (NAVFAC) Washington manages the planning, design, and construction of shore facilities for the U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, and other federal clients in the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Northern Virginia. Led by Captain Rame’ Hemstreet, Civil Engineer Corps, U.S. Navy, we manage more than $1 Billion in annual business volume.

  With a workforce of approximately 1,500 military and civilian engineers, architects, realty specialists, attorneys, contract specialists, craftsmen, support personnel and other skilled professionals who organize, plan, coordinate and supervise all phases of base facilities maintenance, construction, operations, transportation and utilities to provide the full range of first-class facilities engineering products and services, including:

  *
  Acquisition
  *
  Base development, planning, and design
  *
  Base operating support
  *
  Capital improvements
  *
  Facilities Maintenance
  *
   Utilities

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  Facility Support Contracts (FSC)
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  Environmental programs and services
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  Military construction (MILCON)
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  Real Estate
  * Transportation

  We are also home to several unique functions: White House Special Programs Office, residence support for the Vice President of the United States, Navy Medical Facility Design Office, NAVFAC Litigation, and the Navy Utilities Rate Intervention Group. We are headquartered at the historic Washington Navy Yard, part of Naval District Washington, and have Resident Officer in Charge of Construction (ROICC) offices at:

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  Maloubird on May 31 at 5:21 p.m.

  Thank you for releasing this story!The Few The Proud The Forgotten and it’s members have joined together and have been fighting for the truth for many years now and have been met with a resistance by some media to take this issue on.We love The Marine Corps and believe in what it is and what it stands for.The individuals who have chosen to participate in the cover up of this poisoning of the brave and the innocent are not what the Corps is all about.They are simply individuals who should be called out and stripped of their association to the CORPS.My Father fought in Vietnam and my Brother served as a Marine in Beirut to help clean up the barracks that were blown up by terrorist.I was conceived,born,and raised on military bases all over the world and I know what Honor is and hiding from the truth and using a play on words to cover up facts is not a definition of what being a Marine is!Semper FI!Mary Blakely

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  RxDoctorEJD on June 07 at 1:05 p.m.

  Thank you for writing this story. I used to be blindly loyal to the Marine Corps, even after my medical retirement seventeen years ago. While I still love the Corps, the handling of the polluted water investigation has opened my eyes to another side of the Corps that I wish did not exist. I see now supposed men of honor acting like corporate bean counters engaged in a massive CYA operation. There is no Marine on active duty directly at fault for any part of the actual contamination yet there are senior officers that must know in their hearts that the Marine Corps is letting people down. I did not receive the memo that stated we had changed our motto from “Always Faithful” to “Sometimes Faithful.” Thank God for Marine leaders like Jerry Ensminger at tftptf.com for taking care of the troops and accomplishing the mission of seeing that justice is done.