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Noah Berger / AFP/Getty Images
Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay. San Francisco officials plan to build high-rise residential developments on the former Navy base.
As U.S. Navy officials readied a report this summer acknowledging a broader history of radioactive contamination at Treasure Island, they also sought to prevent California health officials from adding to the written record their concerns that the cleanup had been mishandled, according to internal emails.
The Navy acknowledged for the first time on Aug. 6 that the former Treasure Island Naval Station, where San Francisco plans to build a 20,000-resident high-rise community, was home to a repair and salvage operation for the Pacific fleet and that some of those ships could have been contaminated with radiation. The draft report also said that a school preparing sailors for nuclear warfare might have left behind radioactive residue.
The study came in response to regulators with the California Department of Public Health, who since 2010 have pressed for details after cleanup workers found radioactive waste in unexpected locations.
Internal emails show that health officials asked the military as recently as mid-May to step up radiation testing efforts. Military officials, meanwhile, pressed for health regulators not to present their concerns in writing.
On May 10, Anthony Konzen, a Navy manager of the Treasure Island cleanup, wrote in an email that he did not believe that California public health officials had the authority to regulate the cleanup of radioactive materials.
“I don’t believe comments will be needed,” he wrote.
The California Code of Regulations gives the health department the authority to certify whether radiation levels in a vacated facility are safe for human contact. Navy officials, however, emphasize the primacy of federal Superfund cleanup law, implemented by state toxics officials. A health department spokesman explained in an email that the agency provides radiation expertise to cleanup officials and it enforces California laws designed to protect the public from harmful effects from radiation.
On May 15, Navy cleanup manager David Clark exchanged emails with a state toxics official saying it would be better if health officials only expressed their concerns verbally during meetings.
“It would be nice to avoid another letter if we can answer the questions now,” Clark wrote.
On May 17, James Sullivan, the Navy’s environmental coordinator also expressed a wish not to see public health regulators’ written memos.
“If you receive the memo, don’t send it to us,” Sullivan wrote to a state toxics official. “If after your review, DTSC (Department of Toxic Substances Control) is not satisfied with the content, and/or if it is not clearly written and to the point, I would recommend sending it back to CDPH for revision. That way, the Navy does not receive any memo from CDPH that DTSC has not endorsed.” He followed up to say his Navy superiors agreed.
Nonetheless, four hours later senior health department physicist Larry Morgan produced a memo criticizing the Navy’s handling of the cleanup.
“There have been several (high-radiation) shipments and about a thousand intermodal (containers) of radium waste shipped from Treasure Island,” he wrote, adding that previous Navy explanations for the radioactive waste on the island were insufficient.
The Navy took 1,500 soil samples throughout Treasure Island testing for chemical waste, yet failed to examine them for radioactivity, despite the possibility they were contaminated, Morgan wrote.
“This is not an acceptable” radioactive cleanup, he wrote.
The memo included an attached 2011 message saying the Navy had failed to respond to requests for documentation of its work, and that it had been ordered to halt operations because workers had been improperly transporting radioactive waste. Unless the Navy followed health department orders, the city of San Francisco would be saddled with decontaminating the island itself, the attached message said.
Morgan followed up with a June 6 memo urging the Navy to broaden its search for potential radioactive contamination and conduct long-term testing for the possible presence of elements such as cesium-137, a carcinogen used in industrial instruments, and which is also a byproduct of nuclear explosions.
By writing the memos, Morgan’s concerns are part of the public record.
In its Aug. 6 report, the Navy responded that cesium-137 was not a problem because devices containing the element had been handled properly over the years. Some Pacific fleet ships were exposed to Cold War atomic blast tests. But Navy officials said at an Aug. 21 community meeting that only decontaminated ships were berthed at Treasure Island.
About 20 island residents attended the meeting, alarmed by the recent disclosures after learning of them through coverage by The Bay Citizen, sister site of California Watch. Many complained the Navy had not fully informed them about potential radioactivity near their homes. One resident questioned asked why the California Department of Public Health was not represented at the meeting.
In an interview, Sullivan said that his May 17 message sought to make sure he only received opinions from the proper agency. In his view, that’s not the Department of Public Health.
“It’s really (the Department of Toxic Substances Control) that is the representative of the state,” he said. “From our viewpoint, we are looking to DTSC to provide us the input.”
In a conference call interview, three state toxics officials said they disagreed with health department physicists who have claimed since 2010 that the Navy botched its radiation cleanup. Treasure Island is safe for human habitation, they said.
However, Saul Bloom, head of the base-cleanup watchdog Arc Ecology, said the Navy’s base cleanup program has a history of seeking the most lenient regulator.
“The Department of Toxic Substances Control sees its role as helping move properties off the Navy’s books,” Bloom said. “The Department of Public Health sees its role as protecting public health.”
Navy cleanup spokeswoman Melanie Ault wrote on Monday that, “The emails and memorandums cited should not be taken to imply that the Navy is working outside the regulatory process for environmental cleanup actions at Treasure Island.”
Instead, she said, the Navy expects the state of California to “speak with one voice through DTSC.”
Bloom, along with former San Francisco Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, has sued the Navy for allegedly conducting an inadequate Treasure Island environmental review.
“The top Navy cleanup officials are not merely burying their head in the sand,” Peskin said after reviewing the Navy messages. “They’re writing emails that say they don’t want to know the truth about radioactive waste.”
The Bay Citizen is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, member-supported news organization covering the San Francisco Bay Area.
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The longer everyone argues and sues the longer possible contamination sits on the ground. Any action would be better than no action at this point. Procedural corrections are easier to make while work is under way than while everyone is sitting in court chambers and council rooms arguing. We'll never get it done if this keeps up!
i was in the navy for 25 years, retired in 1982 (you do the math). back when i first joined in the late 50s, through our ignorance we all made some huge enviormental mistakes. we now need to clean up as much as possible.
HA HA ! The Pentagon thinks less of us than even Romney !
I was in for 10 years, after Jerry's retirement and it continued then as well. This story is revealing a Navy attitude that is consist with what I saw: hide, cover up, minimize, paint over, etc. anything to down play when people raise concerns.
Without reliable independently verifiable ambient Rad levels, methodical scanning and soil samples you have no idea what the real story is. Get detectors on the base and see for yourself.
The Gopvernment/Navy at its best looking after your safety and health and serving you to their best abilities.
Have faith and believe in your government telling you the truth Phuleeeese!!!
Isn't this the agency (the DOD) the GOP wants to give tons of taxpayer money? And this is what the US citizens get in return?
Really, under an Obama WH this is a GOP problem. Is there ever a problem that would not be a GOP problem. I'm just asking because your comment is ludicrous.
The military wastes more money than any agency--yep, give them more. In the case of defense contractors, cost plus and no bid contracts are always wise use of taxpayers money.
You don't really think that our government would lie to us, do you?
(Unfortunately I guess that I have to state here that I am kidding!)
Linda, hate the GOP do you? Get a life away from welfare.
I wish that were the case. I have faith and belief in the kingdom.
This is a pissing contest between two California state agencies and the Navy is caught in the middle. I don't blame the Navy for just dealing with one of them and "only" one of them and telling the other one to go piss up a rope.
Terry you sound like you know nothing, but are just "pissed" off at the State.
It's not a pissing contest between two state agencies with the Navy caught in the middle. It is one state agency actually doing its job and looking out for the well being of its citizens, while the other says yes sir, anything you want sir to the Navy. The Navy knows the one agency will be lenient and cower to there demands, so it wants it to keep the other agency straight.
It is a case of California wanting to jump to the Navy aand not addressing the issue with the organization that's higher than them. No Respect for Chain of Command. Be sides if Ca. doesn't want it they don't have to take it. I bet they are thinking money and chomping at the bit. Sue the Navy? Uhhh, sure, what ever, pat on the back, nice try.
the Navy is not caught in the middle, they're on top of the food chain and have now been caught with their pants down. just ask any cancer survivor from Camp Lejeune in NC about the Navy (the USMC is a dept of the Navy). I spent 6 years in the Navy and 'bury now, delay later' is generally their mantra. they need to suck it up and clean up the property, PERIOD.
Most all industry, whether federal or private, had a dump it in the ditch mentality regarding hazmat for decades upon decades. Love Canal, Times Beach, just about any major river in the east of the Mississippi.
You do realize when you say the Navy needs to suck it up and clean it, you & me i.e. we tax payers, are the ones who are paying for it.
Practically every major military installation is a hazardous waste site. I was stationed at NAS Barber's Point, Hawaii for some years, several decades ago. There's a coral pit outside the main gate that the base used as a dumping ground for all sorts of aviation related chemicals...along with most ditches at the end of the various flightline ramps.
Tight controls, less use of chemicals to begin with and strong enforcement of regs is the way to keep all of us healthy and safe.
Unless of course the EPA also gets dumped over the side as well here in the near future.
I agree with you K-man- "Practically every major military installation is a hazardous waste site." I've served on many and I can personally attest to that. But, since this is the taxpayers money, are you endorsing that we leave the mess? I say clean it up. Stacey's right.
Yesterday's generation made the mess, this generation gets to pay for cleaning it up. I don't like it either but we can't just leave it.
James Sullivan, the Navy’s environmental coordinator, is actually a civilian.
First and foremost, the Navy doesn't want anything documented in print so that if the levels become to large and to hazardous they can't be fingered for telling a bald faced lie. CDPH needs to have all of this in written format so as to prevent the construction of this residence area.
CBR : this is where you are wrong. IF, on the premise it were you that was going to live in any one of those 20,000 residences and you became ill due to the effects of this level of radiation and did not know this then you would have NO recourse in you health insurance claims and it would be a mystery as to where it came from and how to treat you. On the flip side of that coin, IF you did know where it came from and you were gravely ill due to the effects on ANY level then you MIGHT, maybe have recourse to file a tort lawsuit against the US Navy.
Allowing this construction to go forward only marks the end of the Navys' responible action in insuring that the island is safe and fit for human habitation and since it is NOT fit to be lived on or anywhere near it then the NAvy needs to assume accountable action and see to it that the ground is free from further issues. This is not just a matter of a pissing contest as one of you have mentioned but doing the right thing versus turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to the very same people who supported the NAvy ( and still do). This present form of government is supposedly transparent up to a degree. At which point this level of transparency needs to be addressed and all further efforts by the NAvy stopped cold in their tracks. Allowing the NAvy to walk away from this item or any other gives them carte blanche and I for one am opposed to the whole idea of even thinking about building anything on that wretched piece of dirt other than to put the Navy back in its place and make them....absolutly MAKE them keep the dam place and let them deal with the issue they created. Anything less is to let them walk right over the top of the same citizenry that supported them in the first place.
Hands down that they do this the right way and continue to press the Navy for WRITTEN documentation that the NAVY did the wrong move and attempted to shift this under the carpet....and that....is very reminescent of the USSR. Get it done Navy.....or get out of the nuke biz altogether....and by the way NAVY Public Affairs office....I use to work for your Departmentof the Navy and this is one of your own that STRONGLY objects to you even thinking about endangering us any more.
Don needs to revisit the decommissioning provisions and who the responsible caretakers were/are. The state of Goofalornia made the grandiose plan to create their utopia and they need to just back off; they screwed-up.
Food for thought -
and if you don't believe wikipedia -
just showing that a little radiation isn't such a bad thing. And in an overcrowded city like San Francisco (based on housing costs), they have more to gain from cleaning up Treasure Island than the Navy does by giving the land away at a substantially reduced price/free. If they need the land, then let them clean it up, or pay the Navy appropriately for the island and let them clean it up.
Madman, I completely agree with that. If it's a donation, then the military should not be held liable for the clean up and and it should be up to the benefactor to decide what to do with the property.
If the city does not want to clean it up, then they should condem the property and kick everyone out. But it doesnt make sense to ask the donator (il.e. military) to clean up the property, at additional expense to taxpayers, for human occupation.
BTW, I don't think the end client/residents are getting property for free so they should be mad at someone, whoever sold them the property.
The only reason they are giving the land to the City of SF is because it would cost to much to clean it up. They are giving it to SF in hopes of sticking them with the clean up bill, which with all the cities filing for bankruptcy is rediculous. According to federal and state laws the contaminator is suppose to clean up their messes. Superfund was developed to clean up when that isn't possible, but has totally failed. For the Navy to use a subsequent law to get around their responsiblities is typical. If they would have done the job correctly in the first place the contamination wouldn't be this bad and this would be a non-issue.
Who contaminated the land in the first place? The Navy. Therefore its the Navy's responsibility to clean it up, whether it's to be occupied by people or not. If there's radiation contamination, it needs to be cleaned up properly to prevent it from spreading into the food and water chain.
Oh come now, how many Sailors do you think have been station on Treasure Island over the years? If any one or several of them had suffered from Radiation Poison over the many years it would have hit the News Big Time. Dan, you wrote a lot of what, about what, that is alot of Dribble to me. I don't what your so concerned about, you'll never live there anyway. You have never been in the Military and haven't got a clue about anything of Regulations of Propety Turnover.
You would not hear about. I was in the Navy in McMurdo and we had a leaking reactor there. Hundreds of people have got cancer since including me. Luckily I caught my thyroid cancer early before it spread, but a lot of others were not so lucky. Bet you don't hear about this in the news do you?
Bob...it was in the news. Remember this was dismantled back in 1972 so it was not new to anybody.
I just visited Treasure Island this weekend on a whim while waiting for a late day flight out of Oakland. I was only vaguely aware of the past behind it when I went, but read up on it on the flight home.
What a strange and haunted place. Looks like any other old Navy base, save for the amazing location between downtown SF and Oakland, and there's tons of Old Navy housing that civilians are currently living on. There seems to be a winery set up in one of the old Navy helo hangars, and the area seems to be served by one lone deli located in the old main gate guardhouse and a pizza restaurant.
But as you drive through you notice entire blocks of vacated and clearly unused housing that are fenced off and marked with radiation signs, sometimes only a few meters away from functioning housing with children playing out front.
Feels like a very unusual American version of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone.
Looks like time for some criminal charges against some Navy crooks.
Ahhh, yes - government too big to succeed...........
So even if they do the testing. Are the standards for basic population and building up of the area going to be the same 5, 10 or 20 years from now. I would not take a chance. So in the mean time this is a hot potato game.
If the civilian health physicists say there is a radiation contamination problem, there is a radiation contamination problem.
It's not something that is up for argument. There are standards for contamination and human occupation and exposure and if those standards are not met, it's a problem. I believe the civilian physicists before I believe any commanding generals regarding contamination.
Anyone would have to be half a fool to buy property on a former military base though, especially close to a dock. Bring your geiger counters.
If California is so concerned with contamination then the Navy should just keep the island, why are we in such a hurry to develop more homes in such a beautiful location? Someone is going to make a lot of money is why.
Tax revenue
Tax revenue for the tax and spend democrats!!!
Look at the plus side, your electric bill will go down because you will glow in the dark.
hey beevus, the ocean is rising, remember? blacktop the sumbeach and put a bigast rc gun on it to shoot
invaders, like they used to in the old days....
San Francisco, the city that cries WOLF! Ignore them. They won't go away, but ignore them anyways.
California, the land of Fruit and Nuts.
6dogs, don't forget the large amount of flakes thrown into the mix.
I was born and raised in the Golden State, but have realized since that California is a wonderful place to be FROM!
I was stationed at Tresure Island back in 85, what are the symptoms? Maybe im radioactive, Oh well
If you buy snake oil from a snake oil peddler, who is the dummie here? The buyer. The same happens with America and not just today, but it has been that way for always.
The government, regardless of which party, president is in charge, they always will lie. That has been the MO ever, so why the embedded media is trying to pass this "eureka moment" as once in a blue moon deal when it is our daily bread. If it comes from government, politicians it's lies, and not just lies, but lies galore. Who is the dummie that can or would believe the boy who cried wolf? The believer that falls again and again for the same baloney of always.
Look at ever tragedy that happened, including Pearl Harbor, and you could see, as far as the eyes can see, that government can't be trusted, ever, to tell the truth. Politicians always hide their true intentions under the auspices of law and order, security, freedom, when we all know that is as far from their true intentions as democracy and Christianity from this "Christian and democratic" nation.
We, after all these years, haven't been able to find out what really happened at Pearl Harbor, the assassination of Marilyn Monroe, pre 9/11 and yet the blind sheep read this news and look amazed, surprised like it has never happened before. Thank God for those war criminal Nazis we took from Germany at the end of WWII, otherwise, we could be the most retard nation ever. Imagine, we are the only nation that loves to tax the poor and middle class to death while allowing corrupt corporations milk uncle Sam til the last drop so they can swim in a sea of billions. The 99% w/o shelter, health care, infrastructure, with one, if not the worst, education system in the world, w/o jobs and still keep a straight face declaring how "Christian, democratic" we are.
Unfortunately, if it comes from the government, with very few exceptions, it's bad for the citizens. Just because the dumb, deaf and blind crowd doesn't seem to notice it, doesn't make it go away.
Heck, it was reported today how even the circumstances sorrounding the death of OBL appear full iof holes, contradictions and as usual nobody seems to care. Heck, even the Sandusky controversy has more holes than a Swiis cheese. We have to admit, we are not better, but maybe worse, than those "rogue" regimes we so despise. When the government wants to lie, it does it better than even the Nazis with their now famous propaganda. Imagine, Jessica Lynch passed out due to an accident and when she wakes up, she turns into a "heroine" w/o even realizing it. But the epiotme of arrogance has to come form general McGlass and his Pat Tillman affair. Even when everybody finally knew what had happened, of course, not all the truth, the whole truth because that is garlic to Dracula, I mean America, the general still decided to recommend Pat Tillman that didn't even see the "friendly" bullet(s) that killed him that he deserved his medals and to add insult to injury, those G.I.s that jeopardize their careers, lives for defending the Constitution from corrupt government, war criminal generals are treated like Muslims. I, for one, will never believe any thing and every thing that comes from extreme Pinochios. I'm not that dummie.
lets see, soldiers that suffer from illness due to exposure of toxic chemicals and elements while overseas or from testing that was performed on them by our own armed services on bases at home either with or without their consent have to fight for or are denied medical treatment by the Veterans administration. An untold number of service personnel were exposed to unknown levels of radiation while serving on contaminated vessels and performing cleanup of toxic waste without the proper training or equipment. The services don't care about the welfare and safety of its own personnel so why should they care about the public at large? This is criminal but no one will be charged and it will eventually get swept under the rug. I bet that if someone collected samples of the contaminated soil and sent it to the home and families of the people in charge they wouldn't hesitate to lock the sender up and throw away the key but it would bring home the point that it is not safe for the public.
Why would anybody think that TI was not contaminated. Thank the Congress for closing TI to start with. When they realigned the military bases on the West coast California got really screwed. They thought they were getting all this free land that was in pristine condition. You got to be kidding everyone who has a brain would know the land is tainted with something. So now the free land is going to cost a whole bunch. Thank you Congress.
After this many years only Cesium and Strontium should dominate. Assuming little Uranium or Plutonium contamination. It should not be hard to test for these and end the controversy, sooner than later.
I love how the USN's response to any concern is "get bent". From this to the side scan sonar that deafens sea mammals... GET BENT is their response?
Guess you're allowed to say that when you're being touted as a force for global "good". Whatever that means???
Keep testing the side scan radar, national defense trumps whales any time...hell, the Japanese are just going to hunt them into extinction anyway
National defense from what? Al Queda submarines? I won't say 'never', but we will be able to see that threat develop from a million miles away and react THEN if necessary.
I was deeply involved in the Navy's ASW program back when there was a threat. A shame to see all of those billions in equipment go to waste but I'll take the lack of a sub surface threat and the healthy hearing of sea mammals that goes with that any day.
I was released from active duty there in Dec 1972. What found memories.
Face it people, if it weren't for the idiots in congress who decided to close these installations and gut our national defense there wouldn't be this "problem"...and if it weren't for the greedy local governments that see $$$$ to be stolen they wouldn't be building expensive housing on TI. Hope all the bas turds glow in the dark.