Toxic Waste Cleanups Decline

The number of toxic waste sites cleaned up under the Superfund program declined for the third straight year, according to a recent EPA report. In fiscal year 2003, EPA completed work at just 40 toxic waste sites, compared with 42 in FY 2002 and 47 in FY 2001. In the last four years of the Clinton administration, EPA completed an average of 87 cleanups per year. “We just have fewer dollars to start new projects,” Marianne Horinko, an EPA associate administrator who oversees toxic cleanup, told the New York Times. The Superfund program, which was established to locate, investigate and clean up the nation’s worst toxic waste sites, is funded primarily by an industry-financed trust fund. This fund -- after which the program is named -- was created through a tax imposed mainly on chemical and petroleum companies, the idea being that they should have to cover the costs of cleaning up their own pollution. Since the tax expired in 1995, the program’s funds have dwindled. Yet contrary to its predecessors, the Bush administration has opposed reauthorization of the tax, leaving Superfund strapped for cash. In fact, the trust fund was scheduled to run out of money last month, according to recent projections by the General Accounting Office. “We teach our children that they are responsible for cleaning up the messes that they make,” said Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club. “The Bush administration should demand no less of corporate polluters.”
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