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Backed by a coalition of activists and endorsed by their county’s leading public health official, Richmond City Councilmember Gayle McLaughlin’s call for a change in oversight at two toxics-contaminated shoreline sites won the unanimous endorsement of her colleagues Tuesday. 

If accepted by the California Environmental Protection Agency, the city’s request would give the state Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) the lead role in the ongoing cleanups at UC Berkeley’s Richmond Field Station and the adjacent Campus Bay site. 

Tuesday’s vote represents a major victory for the activists of the Bay Area Residents for Responsible Development (BARRD), a coalition formed in response to earlier actions at Campus Bay, and for McLaughlin and the Richmond Progressive Alliance to which she belongs. 

An earlier version of the measure had been voted down two weeks earlier, despite the protests of a packed audience. 

Sherry Padgett, BARRD activist and an outspoken critic of cleanup activities at both sites, hailed the council’s action. 

“I’m impressed that the council came around to the right answer and unanimously passed the resolution. After they read the facts, they came to the same conclusion as has the rest of the community, that DTSC should be in charge,” she said.  

Padgett works mere yards away from Campus Bay and emerged as a critic after she became the victim of several life-threatening cancers and other ailments her doctors said they believed were caused by environmental exposures. 

Peter Weiner, a leading San Francisco attorney who has volunteered to lead the legal fight for BARRD, said, “The unified expression of the city council in asking the California Environmental Protection Agency for action is both very unusual in itself and very important to state government. My expectation is that Cal EPA will listen very closely.” 

Both DTSC and the water board are EPA sub-agencies.  

Richmond Mayor Irma Anderson, who had voted no on the earlier proposal, said Tuesday, “I feel the resolution now. . .is a win-win proposition. I’d like to thank Councilmember McLaughlin.” 

Though more than thirty people had signed up to speak in favor of the resolution, Mayor Anderson told them it wouldn’t be necessary. The council was now willing to give its endorsement. 

“I’m willing to make it unanimous,” said John Marquez, who had voted against the earlier draft. 

Beaming, McLaughlin praised Anderson, new City Manager Bill Lindsay, Padgett, BARRD, the business owners who live near the sites and the community for their backing. 

Though UC Berkeley had resisted the switch, Contra Costa County Public Health Director Wendel Brunner offered support in a Feb. 18 letter to Lindsay. 

While both sites had been under the jurisdiction of the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board, the board ceded control over the upland portion of Campus Bay following a Nov. 6 legislative hearing on the site called by Assemblymember Loni Hancock. 

Brunner’s testimony played a major role in that change. In his letter to the Richmond council endorsing McLaughlin’s proposal, Brunner wrote concerning Campus Bay that “the Regional Water Quality Control Board has neither the expertise or experience to handle a site this complex.” 

Brunner also noted, “In my 20 years of experience as Public Health Director, the [DTSC] has been the lead agency in the remediation of all toxic sites in Contra Costa that have been this complex.” 

Although he wasn’t as concerned with the Richmond Field Station—also known as Bayside Research Campus—Brunner wrote that “nevertheless, I believe the DTSC would be the best agency to provide oversight to that property also.” 

Both sites hosted long-term manufacture of dangerous compounds, contaminating the soil and shoreline marsh with a wide range of highly dangerous substances ranging from heavy metals such as mercury as well as a variety pesticides, some now banned, to noxious volatile organic compounds, PCBs and similar hazardous and potentially lethal chemicals.  

UC Berkeley registered strong opposition to the measure when it first appeared on the council’s agenda on Feb. 15. Mark B. Freiberg, director of the university’s Office of Environmental Health and Safety, told the council that the school was quite happy running its own cleanup under water board supervision. 

The original measure was twice defeated at that meeting, in part because several councilmembers wanted Brunner’s input before they voted. The physician wrote his letter three days later. 

McLaughlin’s resolution was redrafted, incorporating the council’s concerns that the water board continue to play a role under DTSC supervision, and brought back to the council. 

Included in the draft was a new provision that calls for deed restrictions on both sites to protect the public health and safety to “return these properties to the tax rolls for the long term benefit to the residents and businesses of Richmond.” 

Freiberg was present in the audience for the unanimous vote. He didn’t sign up to speak during the public hearing nor did anyone from Cherokee Simeon Ventures, the firm set up by Marin County developer Russ Pitto and a multinational venture capital firm to develop Campus Bay. 

Activists focused on the Field Station in November after a Daily Planet report revealed that the university had picked CSV as their choice to build a 2.2-million-square-foot corporate/academic research complex on the site. 

BARRD and other Richmond environmental activists, most notably Ethel Dodson, have criticized Cherokee Simeon’s role of the Campus Bay cleanup, and word that the firm may be developing the second site spurred them into action and led to the inclusion of both sites in McLaughlin’s resolution. 

Padgett said the next stage for the activists is making certain that Cal EPA follows through on the council’s request.