News Coverage
Christine Todd Whitman Ends Her Tenure as Chief of the EPA Leaving Unanswered Questions About a Controversial Case of Industrial
Published June 26, 2003
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This is Christine Todd Whitman's last day as chief of the Environmental Protection Agency. She spent much of her two years on the job defending the Bush administration against attacks by environmental organizations. And as she leaves, there are new questions about the administration's bid to settle a controversial case of industrial pollution. NPR's Peter Overby reports.
PETER OVERBY reporting:
Anniston, Alabama's PCB problem dates back to the years when the Monsanto Company produced the compounds there for use in electrical equipment. PCBs are extremely carcinogenic, and they were banned in the 1970s. But around Anniston, they continue to contaminate neighborhoods, streams and lakes. One week last year, a state court found Monsanto negligent and liable for the pollution. A court order was expected for a clean-up at company expense. But the following week, EPA administrator Whitman held a meeting on the matter. There are no public records of what was said. A week after that came news that the administration had made a deal with Monsanto and two successor companies signing a consent decree that would pre-empt the state court. That consent decree could save the corporations involved millions of dollars.
In Anniston, David Baker is founder of the citizens group Community Against Pollution. He has a question: Does the timing of Whitman's meeting suggest the EPA worked with Monsanto to derail the state court process?
Mr. DAVID BAKER (Founder, Community Against Pollution): It shows that somebody has something to do with the consent decree that should not have anything to do with it. You know, really, I can't say which one would be the better, whether the state would or whether the EPA, but I do know that we need to have something done and we need to have it done in a hurry.
OVERBY: Baker's PCB levels are unusually high. He's had seven operations to remove cysts and boils which he says are PCB-related, even though science has found no such connections. Baker and Ken Cook, head of a Washington organization, the Environmental Working Group, have written to Whitman asking what happened at the meeting. She hasn't responded. EPA treated the first announcement of the consent decree as big news from Washington. But now questions about Anniston are steered to Stan Meiberg, EPA's deputy regional administrator in Atlanta. He oversees the case and was called up to Washington for the Whitman meeting.
Mr. STAN MEIBERG (EPA's Deputy Regional Administrator, Atlanta): The administrator had asked for an information briefing following several national stories that had appeared on Anniston. We handled it the same way that we would handle any other request.
OVERBY: Meiberg says he gave Whitman an update. She asked questions. But he didn't get marching orders from her or anyone else on how to handle Monsanto.
Mr. MEIBERG: I do not know if the administrator ever met with other folks from Monsanto, but from my standpoint, I certainly felt no pressure.
OVERBY: Another question: Did Monsanto go over Meiberg's head to lobby Washington officials for a break? Heather White, general counsel of the Environmental Working Group, says she's been trying for months to find out.
Ms. HEATHER WHITE (General Counsel, Environmental Working Group): Who from Monsanto met with administrator staff as they were negotiating this consent decree? That's all we want to know, and we haven't gotten any responses to that question.
OVERBY: And finally, did a Justice Department lawyer lean on an environmental advocate to change her court testimony? Janet McGilvray(ph) said yesterday that one did. When she was preparing to testify against the consent decree, she got a barrage of phone calls from the Justice Department lawyer who had negotiated it. He urged her to reconsider.
Ms. JANET McGILVRAY: I felt intimidated. I felt that it was so inappropriate for an attorney to be calling me repeatedly, giving me various reasons as to why I would be doing something that I shouldn't be.
OVERBY: Justice Department spokesman Blaine Rethmeier said the lawyer did nothing wrong.
Mr. BLAINE RETHMEIER (Justice Department Spokesman): It was our goal to inform her that the consent decree was in line with everything that we had intended to have in the case, and our goal was to get the clean-up under way, and that is exactly what the consent decree provided for.
OVERBY: What the consent decree actually provides for is not a clean-up but a study of how to clean some of the worst of the PCB pollution in Anniston. An actual clean-up is still years away.