The Environmental Protection Agency wants to clean up a Superfund site in Dutchess County. Lower Hudson Valley Bureau Chief Elias Guerra went to the site at Wappinger Creek to find out more.
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“If you do want to catch a big fish, you could use hot dogs, worms, all of that. Corn. Like my brother's bait he made right there with chicken. And that's mostly it. Wesley, what are these called? What kind of lure is that called? Swim bait? You could use those, you'll catch a monster bass. Or you could use bread to catch like bass, catfish, sunnies, bluegill, like that's mostly it.”
That’s the voice of Emmett talking with his big brother, Wesley Willsey, who I met at the bridge next to Market St. Industrial Park in Wappingers Falls. The bridge runs over Wappinger Creek, which is a superfund site as designated by the Environmental Protection Agency in 2016.
According to the EPA, “from the early-1800s through the late 1900s, the facilities in the industrial park, include[ed] manufactured gas plants, metal plating, cloth dyeing, and [a] bleachery facility.” And they “dumped their wastewater into the creek.”
Recently, the EPA extended the public comment period, which opened in July, to give people more time to give input on the EPA’s cleanup proposal.
The plan specifically addresses mercury contamination, and would involve digging up all contaminated sediment in the creek, and then filling it in with clean soil.
The Superfund site location runs from the Market Street Industrial Park, where I met Emmett and Wesley Willsey, down to where the creek meets the Hudson River.
Cleaning up the rest of the creek will come after the lower portion is completed.
The EPA did not immediately respond to a request for comment but Riverkeeper said they are very satisfied with EPA’s choice. Dan Shapley, Senior Director of advocacy policy and planning at Riverkeeper, said it’s important for people to know the contamination is in the soil, and touching the water or paddling does not pose a danger.
But he is concerned that people fishing in the creek might not know about the contamination, and eat the fish.
“The biggest concern would come from, you know, families who who maybe can't afford to go to the grocery store and and are relying on the fish they catch as a meal regularly and feeding it to their children.”
When I was at the creek, I didn’t see any signs either warning about the contamination, but the fishermen said there was a sign about half a mile away in English and Spanish, warning people not to eat the fish.
They said anyway, almost everybody who fishes at the bridge, knows not to eat it, with some exceptions, Willsey told me.
“I know these guys. They're from Russia. They come up down here every year just to eat the carp out of here. So they eat it. I was again fishing and I caught like a really big one. The guy said, ‘you gonna keep that?’ I'm like, ‘no’. Gave it to him. He ate it. And I saw him like the next week, he seemed fine. I just wouldn't eat it out here.”
Garrett Dodge has been coming to the site for years and says he’s very aware the creek is a superfund site and done his own research. He mostly refrains from eating from the creek.
“And would you ever do you ever eat the fish that you catch?
(Garrett Dodge) No. No. except for the striper, the big stripers, you know, or not the the big big ones, but the legal ones, you know, the you know, 'cause I love striper. That's good, you know, with some butter and a little bit of rosemary, you b bake it up in the oven. I mean that's that's tasty. But anything else now, especially the cats. I mean A for one they're bottom feeders, so you never know what they're filtering through their system."
The cats refer catfish, which as Dodge explained, are bottom feeders and closer to the soil, which contains most of the contamination.
Dodge said, as did all the fishermen I spoke to, that he would be very happy if the EPA was to clean up the whole site.
“If they can do it and get away with it, I'm more than happy to to give a blessing. I know it's a what a Superfund site, so I don't know how much the the state or will be pitching in or the locality as long as well as the the feds. something to definitely look into. I mean I wouldn't mind a barrier up there."
The public comment period is open until Sept. 21.
“Your brother was saying you could use just about anything. He was saying you could use bread. It's not like a lure like this, any sort of like food, you could probably catch anything on it. Anything really. I've used a piece of stale bread on the bridge to try to get bait and it worked.”
