Picture postcard of the American Smelting and “Roofing” (actually Refining) Co., Omaha, Nebraska, from 1915. Found in an antique shop in Oklahoma by Rick Galusha.

The long-awaited proposed agreement between ASARCO and the City of Omaha on the demolition, capping and redevelopment of ASARCO’s lead refinery site was submitted as a Development Ordinance to the City Council for a first reading on Tuesday, March 31. This plan requires the City of Omaha to take title to the ASARCO property. The Sierra Club is strongly against this plan for reasons outlined in more detail below.

If you care about your local environment and want to make Omaha a cleaner and safer place for our children and all future generations, now is the time to act! Please pick up your phone NOW and call your City Council members to tell them to vote "NO" on this proposed plan. Then write a follow-up letter and send a copy of it to the Public Pulse Editor of the World-Herald. Even if you have already written or called your City Councilman on this issue, call again NOW. As the City Council will be making a decision on this possibly within the next week, it is important that they hear from all Sierra Club members NOW! Phone numbers and addresses for all City Council Members are listed inside. If you do not know who your City Council member is, please call 444-7200.

According to City Council rules there will be three readings on this plan. A motion was approved at the first reading on March 31 asking that the City Council delay the public hearing for at least a month to give residents time to study the detailed agreement. The motion also asked that the public hearing be held at a later time that would allow working people to attend without missing work. We will try to get copies of this 40-page proposed agreement available at all public libraries so that the general public has a chance to review it prior to a vote on the issue that could greatly affect their tax dollars. This motion will need four City Council votes to be approved.

At the time of this writing (April 1), we do not know when the public hearing will be held. This is a major issue that could affect the health, safety, welfare, and finances of the people of Omaha for years and years to come. It deserves a different procedural time deadline than would be given to minor issues.

We will notify by postcard all Sierra Club members as to when the public hearing will be held, so please watch for this postcard in your mail. Please plan on attending this public meeting. Your presence will make a difference! This is your chance to help make Omaha a cleaner and safer place for your children and all future generations. We need your help! Your presence at the public hearing will send a strong message to the City Council that you are strongly against the plan and want them to vote "NO" on it. It is absolutely essential that we have as many Sierra Club members as possible at the public hearing. Bring your children, friends and neighbors with you. We need a large turnout! If you have any questions on the date or time of this public hearing, or the current status of the ASARCO plan, please call Melissa Gardner at 556-5198, or Mary Green at 556-1830, or Mark Welsch at 558-0463 (after 6 pm).

The Sierra Club is working with many other local neighborhood, environmental and church groups on the ASARCO issue. We are joining forces with these other groups because we share a common concern about the potentially disastrous ramifications of the proposed plan. As a larger coalition with a single purpose (to oppose the proposed ASARCO plan), we can more effectively get our message out to the public, and thus influence the City Council. The position of the coalition is as follows:

The City Of Omaha should not take title to the ASARCO property. Any agreement entered into by the City of Omaha that involves the City owning or leasing property could subject the people of the City of Omaha, as taxpayers, to overwhelming potential financial liability for future environmental problems associated with the site.
Ecological studies of the impact of the ASARCO facility on the Missouri River should be conducted. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has called for studies of the impact of ASARCO on the river, its fish, wildlife and ecosystem before any final decisions are made. The proposed cap is inadequate as it will not stop the discharge of toxic groundwater from the site into the Missouri River, a source of public drinking water. A good plan would cut off all paths of toxic contaminants into the environment.
Other options regarding the clean-up of this site need to be considered. The plan before the City Council proposes to leave huge quantities of the toxic contamination as is. The current plan is a cover-up plan, not a clean-up plan. We support using this land as a park, but let’s have ASARCO properly clean it up first. We want a park that is safe and non-toxic for the environment and the Missouri River, for our children and all future generations. A citizens committee should be established to operate in an advisory capacity to review these other options.
ASARCO should clean up, not cover up their mess. We think it’s good public policy that ASARCO, and not the Omaha taxpayers, should take responsibility to clean up the mess they made and profited by. As a huge, international, multi-billion dollar corporation, they can afford to clean up their mess. They have saved millions of dollars over the years by failing to invest the money in their Omaha plant required to bring it into compliance with federal environmental laws. They have cleaned up toxic sites in other states when forced to do so by local government. Why should Omaha, Nebraska get the short end of the stick?