The Acreage Cancer Study

Hi Everyone,

It is finally Friday! Today's post will be short and sweet. We have several articles below for you to review regarding the Acreage, and a few other articles that pertain to other communities.

Also, just a reminder - there are now 3 videos currently available from the meeting with the FDOH on Tuesday. If you have some time, check out the videos by clicking on the Video tab at the top of the page.

Have a great weekend!

Cancer cluster's impact on Acreage property values can't yet be quantified, but it's not good

By Kimberly MillerPalm Beach Post Staff Writer

Updated: 11:44 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010

Lured by big chunks of land and reasonable prices, Octavio Martinez brought his family to The Acreage in 2003.

He built a home over on 44th Place, and paid it off.

But now, he's considering a move.

Whilehe was an early doubter of the cancer scare that swept the semi-ruralcommunity beginning last summer, the "cluster" label that came lastweek made it all too real.

He's concerned about his 13-year-old daughter's health and his property values. In that order, to be clear.

"Anyone coming here from anywhere with kids, unless they are practically insane, is not going to purchase property in The Acreage," Martinez said. "Our properties are basically worthless."

The Palm BeachCounty Property Appraiser's Office has just begun its 2010 property analysis. John Thomas, the property appraiser's director of residential appraisal services, said it's too soon to tell how the label will affect values in the 110-square-mile Acreage.

Already, the average sale price of homes in the community has fallen from $395,759  at the peak of the real estate boom in 2006 to $196,847 last year _ a50 percent drop.

The community of Jupiter Farms, mostly made up of 1-acre lots or larger, saw its average price fall 42 percent during the same period.

"From Jan. 1, 2009 to Jan. 1, 2010, valueshave trended downward in Palm Beach County and I'm certain the trend inThe Acreage is downward as well," Thomas said. "The difficult part will be how much is attributable to an already bad market or to the publicity ."

A federal lawsuit filed Wednesday alleges defensecontractor Pratt & Whitney is to blame for the brain tumors andcancer in children and teenagers found in The Acreage. The resulting publicity, the suit claims, is responsible for plunging property values.

Martinez is not a named party in the suit.

In the most severe cases of toxic contamination, such as Love Canal or the Escambia Wood Treating Company site in Pensacola, the government buys out homeowners. In 1997, more than 360 households in Pensacola were involved in a $23 million relocation after cancer-causing dioxin was found in the soil.

To view the full article, Click Here.

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Pratt & Whitney: 'No threat to human health' from pollution at plant near The Acreage

By Mitra MalekPalm Beach Post Staff Writer

Updated: 11:08 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010

THE ACREAGE — Pratt & Whitney said Thursday that contaminants at its central Palm Beach County plant "pose no threat to human health," responding to a federal lawsuit that accuses the defense contractor of causing the brain cancer cluster in the nearby Acreage.

"We have put in place a comprehensive environmental, health and safety program that protects the environment, our employees and others in the surrounding communities," said the company, whose plant along Beeline Highway has been the subject of a state-monitored pollution cleanup since the mid-1980s.

The statement added: "Pratt & Whitney maintains an extensive groundwater monitoring system, overseen by state agencies, that shows contaminants pose no threat to human health or to private property in surrounding areas." And the company said it will continue to "cooperate fully" with agencies investigating the cluster.

"Beyond that, it is our policy to not comment on pending litigation," Pratt & Whitney's statement said.

The class-action suit, filed late Wednesday on behalf of four Acreage households, seeks damages for the loss of property values that homeowners have suffered as a result of the cancer cases. The lawsuit also asks a judge's approval to seek damages on behalf of about 10,000 homeowners in and near The Acreage.

To view the full article, Click Here.

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To view the Pratt Whitney Plume, Click Here.

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Acreage, county plead for state, federal help to connect to the public water supply

By Stacey Singer, The Palm Beach Post 11:02 p.m. EST, February 11, 2010

In the wake of the state's finding that a cancer cluster exists inThe Acreage, county and Indian Trail Improvement District officialshave asked the state and federal government for help pay to connecthomeowners to county water.

The most recent study, released this summer, estimated it would cost $300 million to connect the homes.

In a letter to Florida Gov. Charlie Crist,sent on Tuesday, Commissioner Jess Santamaria and Indian Trail Improvement District President Michelle Damone called on Crist to findstate and federal money to help pay for the water hookup.

The county's top health official said she agreed with their plea.

"We're in full support of public water, just for public health reasons," said Dr. Alina Alonso, director of the county's health department.

Santamaria and Damone's letter was penned after new state data released last week showed more than four times the amount of child brain and central nervous system cancers as expected for the region between 2005 and 2007.

To view the full article, Click Here.

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In a California Town, Birth Defects, Deaths and Questions

By JESSE McKINLEYPublished: February 6, 2010

KETTLEMAN CITY, Calif. — State and federal officials are scrambling to determine what caused the deaths of three children in this Central California farming town, which shares a ZIPcode with the largest hazardous waste treatment site west of theMississippi.

Over a 15-month period in 2007 and 2008, six children of mothersfrom Kettleman City were born with serious birth defects, including cleft palates, deformities and brain damage. Half of those infants subsequently died.

And while health authorities have not placed any blame, the apparent cluster of defects has given new ammunition to environmentalists and local residents who have long been wary of the town’s proximity to the Kettleman Hills waste facility, a 1,600-acre landfill that lies in an unincorporated area less than four miles west of here.

“We’ve always been saying, ‘The sky is falling, the sky is falling,’ ” said Maricela Mares-Alatorre, a Kettleman City resident and longtime critic of the facility. “Well, for those mothers, the skyfell.”

To view the full article, Click Here.

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No Cause Found for Cluster of Birth Defects

By JESSE McKINLEYPublished: February 9, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO — State health officials said Tuesday that there was no evidence of a single cause for a series of birth defects in a central California farming town that is adjacent to the largest hazardous waste landfill in the West.

The initial findings from the California Department of Public Health stem from an investigation ordered last month by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. He had voiced concern about a handful of birth defects, and the deaths of three infants, that occurred in children born in 2007 and 2008 to women who had lived in Kettleman City.

The potential cluster of birth defects also drew the attention of the federal Environmental Protection Agency,which last week visited Kettleman City, a town of about 1,500 people inrural Kings County.  Agency officials also toured the 1,600-acre Kettleman Hills landfill, which contains toxic chemicals and other waste and is four miles west of the town.

Despite fears of an environmental cause, the health department said Tuesday that its initial investigation had determined that the rate of birth defects in Kettleman City from 1987 to 2008 was only slightly higher than that of neighboring towns and in surrounding counties.

To view the full article, Click Here.