EPA SLAPPS the Grassroots

US - A Missouri incinerator used to burn dioxin-contaminated soil from a Times Beach PCB-spill was shut down on June 25, 1997 - a year after the plant malfunctioned and puffed chemical toxins over a nearby neighborhood. After the Times Beach Action Group [TBAG, 305 D Mt. Everest, Fenton, MO 63026, (314) 349-5269] revealed that the burner's safety tests were falsified, the EPA ordered an independent retest - and the burner's efficiency scores plummeted 2000 percent. TBAG reports the beleaguered burner has since been "dismantled and moved to Mexico City."

TBAG, has long been a thorn in the side of the EPA. Among TBAG's discoveries: the EPA knew that the incinerator failed to meet legal safety standards; the lab hired to test the incinerator's efficiency was half-owned by the incinerator company; EPA sampling records were mysteriously missing from agency files and; the EPA apparently conspired to conceal the true source of the dioxin that contaminated Times Beach - the Monsanto Corporation.

Still, the TBAG activists were unprepared when, on August 15, 1997, they were hit with a SLAPP suit - courtesy of the EPA. SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) suits are typically used by wealthy corporations to inflict paralyzing legal costs on small citizens' groups opposed to corporate malfeasance. In this case, the EPA demanded that the TBAG hand over all its records within five days or face fines of $25,000 per day until the records were handed over. TBAG staffer Steve Taylor defiantly told the press that, instead of harassing nonprofit citizen watchdog groups, the "EPA should do its own research."