A vast toxic waste dump at the center of a birth defects controversy in Central California has been fined more than $300,000 for allowing cancer-causing chemicals to leach into the soil, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Tuesday.
Residents near the Kettleman Hills landfill previously have expressed concerns that the largest hazardous waste dump in the West was linked to a high rate of birth abnormalities among infants.
However, state officials said last week they couldn’t pinpoint a common cause for the health problems in the community.
The dump’s parent company Waste Management issued a statement Tuesday saying extensive monitoring had confirmed the small concentrations of PCBs – a now-banned transformer fluid – were isolated to an area adjacent to a storage and flushing building.
The material “did not present any risk to public health or the environment,” said Brian Bowen, Waste Management’s director of environmental protection.
Still, local mothers wondered if the soil issue might have affected the development of their children.
“If they’re polluting inside that dump and putting their own workers at risk, what can people in the community expect?” asked Magdalena Romero, 34, whose daughter, America, died a few months after she was born with a cleft palate and other health problems three years ago.
“The real question is what comes of this,” she said.
Landfill operator Chemical Waste Management was hit with a $302,100 fine after failing to clean up soil tainted with spilled PCBs, placing workers at a higher risk of exposure, EPA officials said.