[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 109 (Tuesday, June 28, 2022)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E678-E679]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       RECOGNIZING GOWANUS CANAL REMEDIAL ACTION ENFORCEMENT TEAM

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. NYDIA M. VELAZQUEZ

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 28, 2022

  Ms. VALAZQUEZ. Madam Speaker, I rise to recognize the outstanding 
achievements of Gowanus Canal Remedial Action Enforcement Team at U.S. 
Environmental Protection Agency's Region 2 office. Their outstanding 
efforts at the Gowanus Canal Superfund Site ensured that potentially 
responsible parties (PRPs) completed the main phase of full-scale 
dredging in the upper third of the Canal, the first of three phases.
  The heavily contaminated urban waterway, a 1.8-mile-long canal in 
Brooklyn, NY dating from the 1800s, has been contaminated by industrial 
pollution and combined sewer overflows (CSOs) for over a century. The 
Site was listed on the National Priorities List in 2010. Since listing, 
EPA staff assigned to the project include Christos Tsiamis, Remedial 
Project Manager, Brian Carr, Assistant Regional Counsel, and Natalie 
Loney, Community Involvement Coordinator. Together, they managed this 
large complex project in a thorough

[[Page E679]]

and timely manner from feasibility study through remedy selection in a 
2013 Record of Decision and remedial design for full-scale dredging and 
capping with in-situ stabilization and installation of retention tanks 
to protect the dredged canal from recontamination from combined sewer 
overflows (CSOs).
  The three superfund cleanup sites in New York City fall in my 
Congressional district and the Gowanus Canal is the furthest along and 
proceeding at a precedent-setting pace nationally. The Gowanus Canal 
Community Advisory Group is the largest and most engaged in the 
Country.
  The Team managed enforcement with a disparate group of roughly three 
dozen PRPs including National Grid, the successor to the operator of 
coal gasification plants responsible for a significant amount of coal 
tar related contamination in the Canal, and the City of New York, which 
owns the canal and is responsible for the sewer infrastructure in the 
watershed. The City opposed to both the listing of the Gowanus Canal 
and the CSO portion of the remedy. This made community outreach and 
enforcement more critical and the EPA team's work in this area has been 
exceptional.
  To achieve the timely start of dredging, Project Manager Christos 
Tsiamis and Regional Counsel Brian Carr worked tirelessly, issuing 
unilateral administrative orders in January 2020 to six PRPs, and 
coordinating with multiple contractors, city agencies, and legal and 
technical teams to achieve the remedial mobilization.
  Dredging canal sediments contaminated with coal tar in this densely 
populated urban area posed challenges that were overcome through 
outstanding engineering and oversight by the team. Dredging began in 
November 2020, and the first phase called Remediation Target Area 1 
(RTAl) was completed by mid-2021.
  Mr. Tsiamis, Mr. Carr, and Ms. Loney, met regularly with the CAG, 
local businesses, and other stakeholders. Thanks to their efforts, the 
main phase of dredging was swiftly completed, setting a high bar for 
completion of the next two phases of dredging (RTA2 and RTA3). Although 
enforcement issues remain with respect to the City, obtaining its 
commitment for this work was a major enforcement accomplishment, a 
result that the team worked tirelessly and effectively to achieve. For 
their outstanding work, I would like to recognize EPA Region 2's 
Gowanus remedial action team: Project Manager Christos Tsiamis, 
Assistant Regional Counsel Brian Carr, and Community Involvement 
Coordinator Natalie Loney.

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