MPCA researcher to testify in hearing over 3M chemicals
St. Paul Pioneer Press, Dennis Lien
Published October 23, 2005
Fardin Oliaei could have backed off when her supervisors turned down her research proposals and rejected her requests to speak at scientific conferences.
But Aliakbar Oliaei's daughter hadn't done anything like that before, and she wasn't about to start.
So now, as questions are raised about a troubling family of chemicals once made by 3M Co. downriver from St. Paul, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency scientist is finding the spotlight on herself as much as on her research. More than anything, she wishes it weren't that way.
"I'd rather be in a mental hospital than here,'' Oliaei told the Pioneer Press in her first extended public interview.
By "here," she means her place at the center of a tempest involving the MPCA, 3M and state lawmakers who want to learn more about chemicals once made by the Maplewood-based company and now found in people and animals throughout the world. The chemicals, which don't break down in the environment and have been linked to health problems such as cancer, have prompted several lawsuits across the country. Those include cases in Washington County, where the chemicals have been found in groundwater.
On Tuesday, Oliaei, who has been pressing her employer to uncover more about the chemicals, will testify at a state Senate hearing into whether the MPCA, as the state's environmental protector, is handling the issue adequately.
How Oliaei, a soft-spoken woman who emphasized that she isn't speaking for the agency, found herself in this situation is, in some ways, a testament to her father's influence. He instilled a resolve in his seven children, urging them to study, to achieve academic success, to persevere and to be independent.
"My father greatly encouraged us to get the highest possible degree we could get,'' Oliaei said. "It was his dream.''
Growing up in Tehran, Iran, where opportunities for women were limited, Oliaei watched her father place on a bedroom wall a framed copy of each diploma his children earned. The construction company owner also encouraged them, she said, to dance, paint, write and listen to music.
She said he hoped to build a hospital, where his seven children would all be doctors. Instead, they all got advanced degrees in physics, pharmacy, medicine, engineering, economics and, in her case, environmental science.
Oliaei left Iran three decades ago, earned master's and doctorate degrees in the United States, got married and accepted a teaching position at Northland College in Ashland, Wis. In 1989, after having two children, she and her husband moved to St. Paul, where they accepted jobs at the MPCA.
Eventually, they divorced. To pay private-school tuition for her two boys, Oliaei worked nights, teaching environmental science at local colleges and prisons.
The 51-year-old is an avid bicyclist and runner who has completed a marathon.
Her north suburban home is filled with art. Colorful paintings are on every wall. Busts of composers adorn tables. A piano, almost covered with scientific research papers, occupies a prominent spot in the living room.
Art, exercise and a large, extended family are important, but research is her passion, she said.
At the MPCA, she began working with dioxins and other contaminants. In time, she began learning about perfluorochemicals, chemicals made by 3M over five decades for use in such products as Scotchgard and Teflon and linked to a variety of health effects, including cancer and liver problems. 3M has insisted they aren't a health or environmental problem.
In 2000, 3M began phasing them out, but not before they had turned up in the unlikeliest places.
As the agency's emerging-contaminants coordinator, Oliaei conducted her own research, finding disturbing levels of the compounds in fish in Voyageurs National Park in northern Minnesota. Recently, she found the highest level ever recorded in fish in the liver of a smallmouth bass caught in the Mississippi River near Cottage Grove.
As she proposed more research, she ran into obstacles. Supervisors turned down her proposals as well as requests for her to speak at scientific conferences. Once, she said, they allowed a subordinate to attend a conference instead of her, at almost twice the cost.
She said her relationship with supervisors deteriorated five years ago after she filed a discrimination complaint alleging she had been denied a promotion. It worsened, she said, when Sheryl Corrigan, a former 3M manager, was named MPCA commissioner three years ago.
The friction worsened this year as the agency disciplined her for interviews she gave to a radio station and to a small local magazine. She filed a complaint against the MPCA with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in May and a federal whistleblower lawsuit this summer, alleging harassment and violations of her free speech rights.
The agency has repeatedly declined to comment on Oliaei or her situation. In the past, it has argued it's not a research organization, a position that prompted widespread criticism when it stopped looking into why so many deformed frogs were being found in the state.
Still, Oliaei's job description says she should spend 90 percent of her time on research.
Oliaei said her willingness to challenge her supervisors has been a factor in her problems. "I was one of the very few people who would speak out on issues,'' Oliaei said.
"At this agency, managers can't accept criticism or concerns from staff,'' she added, referring to instances in which she challenged views and got the cold shoulder.
Kathleen Schuler, an environmental scientist at the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, said Oliaei has a strong reputation as a research scientist.
"But they don't seem to be giving her the leeway to do research and publish it,'' said Schuler, adding, "It's important for us to understand what is happening in our Minnesota environment.''
Several other local scientists said they respect her work but didn't want to speak publicly because they don't want to be drawn into the dispute.
The chairman of the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee, Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville, said Oliaei has a reputation for being "very committed, very bright and passionate about doing the right thing.''
It's important, he said, to learn more about those chemicals, even if MPCA management doesn't appear interested.
"People inside and outside the agency are concerned that science is being pushed aside there,'' Marty said. "People who work there say that if the findings we have are desired by top management, great. But if we find things out that they don't want to hear, they ignore it or push it aside.''
"In effect, they are punishing her, trying to make her look bad,'' Marty said. "The treatment she is getting seems to me to be totally inappropriate.''
The dispute, she said, has taken its toll.
"I am completely stressed out about this,'' said Oliaei, who believes she has been the victim of abusive behavior.
"Everyone who knows me says, 'Fardin, how can you stand it?' " she said.
When times get especially tough, she said, she draws inspiration from her father, who died two years ago.
"I feel a connection, a strength from him,'' she said.
But Tuesday's hearing, she said, could be pivotal.
"I don't know what will happen to me,'' she said. "But this is making my body stronger, fighting this injustice.''
