"KALAMAZOO -- John DeKoff lives only a few hundred yards from a mound of 1.5 million cubic yards of potentially carcinogenic, toxic material. And he prefers it stay right where it is."
"'I want it left alone,' he said of the nearby hill — visible over his shoulder in his backyard — made of materials contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, chemicals used in paper recycling and other industrial processes and known to cause cancer in both animals and humans.
'PCBs attach themselves to the soil,' DeKoff said. 'When you start digging into it and moving it around, it dries up and blows in the form of dust. I think a worse short-term problem would be dust, getting it in the air.'
Many of DeKoff’s neighbors have a different view. They want what one called 'Mt. PCB' out of the neighborhood as soon as possible. Every few houses nearby has a yard sign reading: 'Message to EPA: Cleanup, not coverup.'"
Keith Matheny reports for the Detroit Free Press July 7, 2013.
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