{"id":146908,"date":"2016-04-27T11:04:05","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T17:04:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=146908"},"modified":"2016-04-27T11:04:05","modified_gmt":"2016-04-27T17:04:05","slug":"in-texas-rio-grande-valley-residents-have-been-eating-toxic-fish-for-decades","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2016\/04\/in-texas-rio-grande-valley-residents-have-been-eating-toxic-fish-for-decades\/","title":{"rendered":"In Texas, Rio Grande Valley residents have been eating toxic fish for decades"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_146912\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 771px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-146912\" src=\"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/04_13_2016_Donna_Lake_-_dy-9_jpg_800x1000_q100-771x515.jpg\" alt=\"Donna Lake\" width=\"771\" height=\"515\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/04_13_2016_Donna_Lake_-_dy-9_jpg_800x1000_q100-771x515.jpg 771w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/04_13_2016_Donna_Lake_-_dy-9_jpg_800x1000_q100-336x224.jpg 336w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/04_13_2016_Donna_Lake_-_dy-9_jpg_800x1000_q100-768x513.jpg 768w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/04_13_2016_Donna_Lake_-_dy-9_jpg_800x1000_q100.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 771px) 100vw, 771px\" \/><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Douglas Young \/ The Texas Tribune<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">One of four warning signs posted next to polluted Donna Lake.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>DONNA, Texas \u2014 When Emma Quintero moved into her modest, bright blue house eight years ago, she&#8217;d watch\u00a0neighbors pass by\u00a0on their way to fish the\u00a0murky waters of\u00a0two sprawling\u00a0reservoirs and irrigation canals that reach into the Rio Grande Valley like tentacles, delivering water to fields of citrus and vegetables.<\/p>\n<p>She and her husband\u00a0ate\u00a0fish from the\u00a0lakes themselves\u00a0at a local restaurant.\u00a0It wasn\u2019t until about a year after the Quinteros moved\u00a0in that an official with the state health department knocked on their door and handed her a flyer with a dire warning:\u00a0Fish from the Donna Reservoir and Canal System are contaminated with dangerous levels of cancer-causing chemicals and aren&#8217;t safe to eat.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"module align-left half type-aside\">\n<h3>About this article<\/h3>\n<p>This article originally appeared in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2016\/04\/23\/south-texas-toxic-lake-raises-environmental-justic\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Texas Tribune<\/a>,\u00a0a nonpartisan, nonprofit media organization that informs Texans and engages with them about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cI couldn\u2019t sleep that night,\u201d Quintero, 55, said in Spanish recently while sitting at her kitchen table. \u201cIt scared me, and since then I want nothing to do with fish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For 23 years, federal environmental regulators and state health officials have known the fish in the Donna Reservoir and Canal System\u00a0pose major health risks to those who consume them. The lakes have been granted\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/cumulis.epa.gov\/supercpad\/cursites\/csitinfo.cfm?id=0605363\" target=\"_blank\">Superfund status\u00a0<\/a>\u2014 a designation given to the country\u2019s most hazardous sites \u2014 as officials try to figure out how to clean them up.<\/p>\n<p>Though the Donna system\u00a0supplies drinking water for two nearby small cities, environmental researchers have found the water itself to be safe. The problem is the fish, which are somehow ingesting cancer-causing chemicals and retaining them in their fat tissue. For decades, officials have been stumped over the source of the chemicals.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s been illegal to fish in the lake since before\u00a0the Superfund designation,\u00a0and officials have\u00a0launched\u00a0an extensive educational campaign to make sure people know of the danger.<\/p>\n<p>But the lake remains a popular fishing spot, both for recreational fishers and those looking to provide for their families.\u00a0Its miles of shoreline are an open invitation for\u00a0poor families and ambitious\u00a0entrepreneurs\u00a0who see the fish as cheap food or a way to make a quick buck.\u00a0Many are still unaware of the risks. And a permanent fix is likely years away.<\/p>\n<p>For all that\u2019s been done in this small, mostly Hispanic community, the narrative surrounding Donna lake tells\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/apps.texastribune.org\/undrinkable\/\" target=\"_blank\">a familiar story in Texas<\/a>. It&#8217;s one of poor people of color\u00a0exposed for decades\u00a0to dangerous environmental\u00a0contaminants with solutions largely out of grasp.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not so much that it\u2019s an injustice, but how could they let it go on this long?\u201d\u00a0Quintero said.<\/p>\n<h3>Clear danger<\/h3>\n<p>The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency first detected dangerous chemicals in the Donna Reservoir&#8217;s fish in 1993 as part of an investigation into a disproportionate number of infants in the area born with neural tube defects, or birth defects of the brain and spine.\u00a0It appears no definitive connection was made between the birth defects and eating the fish. But the fish were clearly dangerous.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Testing then showed the fish had\u00a0high levels of\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.atsdr.cdc.gov\/toxfaqs\/tf.asp?id=140&amp;tid=26\" target=\"_blank\">polychlorinated biphenyls<\/a>, or PCBs \u2014 a group of chemical compounds once used in electrical and industrial equipment that have since been banned due to health concerns. In fact, the concentration of PCBs discovered in the Donna fish were the highest ever recorded in fish, according to health officials.\u00a0PCBs, which are stored in the fat of the fish, are known to cause liver and immune system problems. Exposure to PCBs by eating contaminated fish also increases the risk of cancer.<\/p>\n<p>The PCB levels are high enough to be of concern not just for people who eat the fish regularly \u2014 208 meals a year is what the EPA calls a subsistence consumer \u2014 but also for recreational fishers.<\/p>\n<p>Residents eating the fish as little as 42 times a year are at risk of ingesting levels of chemicals above the acceptable range for cancer risks, and more than eight times above the acceptable threshold for non-carcinogenic hazards.<\/p>\n<p>In 1994, the state\u00a0enacted a fish possession ban for the reservoir \u2014 a measure reserved for areas that represent the highest health risks. (The possession ban in Donna is currently the only active ban of its type in the state.) Under the ban, residents caught fishing face misdemeanor fines of a few hundred dollars. Two decades later, the fines have\u00a0done little to deter people from fishing in the easily accessible reservoir and canals, and even selling the fish to their neighbors.<\/p>\n<p>With researchers unable to determine the source of the PCBs, the EPA in March 2008 listed the reservoir on its national priorities list, setting into motion several unsuccessful attempts to remove the fish from the lake.<\/p>\n<p>The EPA has attempted to physically remove the fish\u00a0or kill them off by electroshocking the water several times between 2008 and 2012. But the large fish, including species of carp, catfish and largemouth bass, remain.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As long as people continue to eat contaminated fish from this site, the site will continue to pose a public health hazard,&#8221; state health officials wrote in their 2010 health assessment. Those hazards include increased probability of cancer, especially among those who regularly consume the fish.<\/p>\n<p>It appears there have been no comprehensive\u00a0studies to find out what effect 23 years of consumption have had on the health of residents who have consumed the fish since the PCBs were discovered.<\/p>\n<p>Concerns about health risks for mothers and children sound the loudest alarm for state health officials who have said that highly contaminated fish can cause slow mental development among children because a woman can pass the chemicals onto their child while pregnant or while breastfeeding.<\/p>\n<p>Amid all of these concerns, government officials have been largely unsuccessful in preventing residents from both nearby areas and the rest of the Rio Grande Valley from fishing and consuming their catch.\u00a0Leaving residents to continue eating the fish in light of those failed attempts is something\u00a0local organizers, environmental attorneys and residents say is categorically unacceptable.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt what point does the EPA and the state of Texas act to protect people when they know people are being harmed and exposed to cancer?\u201d asked John Henneberger, co-director of the Texas Low Income Housing Information Service, a nonprofit that works on housing and community development problems. \u201cThis in my mind is the definition of environmental racism.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Little enforcement<\/h3>\n<p>Efforts to keep people from catching and consuming the fish are mired in a \u201ccascade of problems,\u201d Henneberger said.<\/p>\n<p>For one, the fishing ban appears to be largely ineffective, officials acknowledge. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is responsible for enforcing the ban, but the department only has one game warden in charge of inspecting the approximately 400-acre reservoir system but has no set patrol schedule, according to a department spokesman Tom Harvey.<\/p>\n<p>There have been some cases in which locals have been issued fines, but few fines have been issued in \u201crecent years,\u201d Harvey said. The department did not\u00a0provide a detailed list of fines levied on residents since the ban took effect.<\/p>\n<p>The EPA, which did not respond to requests for comment, in the past has put up signs around the lake alerting residents about the risks associated with eating the fish, but the signs are regularly vandalized or taken down. At one point, a resident living near the reservoir took a plywood sign and used it to cover the windows of his home during a heavy storm, one resident said.<\/p>\n<p>Last week, there appeared to be no EPA-issued signs along the reservoir. The irrigation district that owns the reservoir recently put up a handful of signs with the words \u201cNO FISHING ALLOWED\u201d outlined in bright red. At least one of those signs had been vandalized just four days later.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is no excuse that they\u2019re allowing people to eat the fish,\u201d said Amy Johnson, an attorney with Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid who is working with local activists. \u201cIt\u2019s very disrespectful to the community that they are letting people poison themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Failed efforts to prevent fishing have pushed some in the community to begin their own education campaigns. But their warnings to neighbors are usually disregarded, said Sandra Carrillo, one resident who is working with community activists to educate locals about the fish.<\/p>\n<p>She likens it to telling her kids that eating candy is bad for their teeth. They don\u2019t believe it until a doctor tells them, Carrillo said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe need someone with authority\u201d to reaffirm what community groups are saying, she added. \u201cIf they know the fish are contaminated, it\u2019s unjust for them to allow people to eat the fish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Texas Department of State Health Services \u2014 which through its own health assessment in 2010 determined the fish presented grave public health problems \u2014 has been relatively active in the community. Health educators with the department regularly give presentations to organizations, such as the local rotary club and parent teacher associations, explaining the health risks associated with the fish in the Donna Reservoir. During those trips, they also drive the length of the canal system to warn people fishing or swimming about the fish.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019ve dropped off flyers at local restaurants and visited health clinics. In August, they attended a back-to-school fair to hand out flyers. But even through those efforts they\u2019ve run into two major hurdles.<\/p>\n<p>Recreational fishers who visit the reservoir aren\u2019t limited to people living nearby. Some travel from other areas of the Rio Grande Valley to fish in the lake. The transient nature of colonia residents also complicates matters.<\/p>\n<p>Health department officials have gone to door-to-door alerting locals about the contaminated fish almost every year since 2009, handing out thousands of educational materials. But new families move into the area regularly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can go out there and six months later and a year later, there\u2019s completely new families,\u201d said Tina Walker, a health educator for the Department of State Health Services. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of a never-ending cycle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And all of this has done little to appease residents who have lived in the area for years and can\u2019t afford to pick up and leave their dilapidated homes despite their health concerns.<\/p>\n<p>Delia Mendoza had no idea the fish were contaminated when she moved into the area with her husband and two children seven years ago. The couple allowed their children to play near one of the reservoir system\u2019s canals that\u2019s situated just a few feet from her front porch, but that quickly changed as soon as they found out about the contaminated fish.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI realized it wasn\u2019t a safe place for children,\u201d Mendoza said, looking over to the murky, brown water in the canal. \u201cSo many people come and fish here, and I imagine they must think like everyone else that what we\u2019re saying isn\u2019t true.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Asked if she would\u2019ve moved there knowing the canal was full of contaminated fish, her answer is short: \u201cNo.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>No known fix<\/h3>\n<p>A solution to ridding the Donna Reservoir of contaminated fish is still far off.<\/p>\n<p>For more than 20 years, environmental regulators were unsure of the source of the PCBs, despite\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.expressnews.com\/news\/local\/article\/EPA-sends-divers-into-Donna-Canal-to-search-for-5377609.php\" target=\"_blank\">sending in divers<\/a>\u00a0on multiple occasions.\u00a0A remedial investigation report\u00a0completed in March by the EPA indicates the toxins could be coming from an old siphon that was constructed around 1928 to feed\u00a0water into the reservoir. PCBs from the siphon might be getting into the sediment, which the fish later ingest.<\/p>\n<p>But the EPA is still months away from formally making that announcement, which is needed to determine a clean-up plan and prepare for the next steps in the remediation process, such as construction to replace the siphon. The EPA will also have to find a solution to removing the remaining contaminated fish.<\/p>\n<p>After almost a decade of looking for a solution, it\u2019s a process that could still take several years. All the while, locals continue eating the contaminated fish.<\/p>\n<p>The long timeline makes it even more crucial that environment and health officials enact effective temporary measures to keep locals from eating the poisoned fish, said Kelly Haragan, director the of environmental law clinic at the University of Texas at Austin.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do think there\u2019s a delay that isn\u2019t reasonable,\u201d Haragan said. \u201cIf this was in a site where people had a lot of political clout and were calling their representatives to get involved in the process, I question whether there would have been that long delay. I can only imagine if this was in Plano, would it be all over the media?\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin is a sponsor of The Texas Tribune.\u00a0A complete list of Tribune donors and sponsors can be viewed\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/support-us\/donors-and-members\/\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For more than two decades, federal and state health officials have known that residents of a poor community in the Rio Grande Valley are eating fish laced with unsafe levels of toxic chemicals, but they haven&#8217;t found a way to stop it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":146912,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[147,2260],"class_list":["post-146908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-environment","tag-texas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=146908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/146912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}