In brief: Westchester County Airport is polluted with highly toxic PFAS chemicals. Yet, the Westchester County Board of Legislators on April 8, 2024 approved a land exchange, “the swap”, of 13.4 acres owned by the Westchester Joint Water Works, for the same sized parcel at the airport. This will allow WJWW to build a water treatment plant at the airport. The problem is that the construction project site is located within the watershed of the Kensico Reservoir. A watershed is the area surrounding a body of water, and any precipitation falling there ends up in that body of water, so a watershed is a basin.

This project could easily dislodge these toxic PFAS chemicals into the nearby Kensico Reservoir. The Kensico is the source of drinking water for 9 million people, including most of Westchester’s population, and many more in NYC. PFAS chemicals have contaminated the drinking water supply for hundreds of communities around the U.S. According to recent findings by the EPA, PFAS are toxic at even the lowest detectable levels and it is extremely expensive to remove them from the water. 

This is an environmental and public health issue.

The 4/10/2024 New York Times article “E.P.A. Says ‘Forever Chemicals’ Must Be Removed From Tap Water” is just the latest evidence that federal and state regulators are judging PFAS to be ever more dangerous to our health. “Exposure to PFAS has been associated with metabolic disorders, decreased fertility in women, developmental delays in children and increased risk of some prostate, kidney and testicular cancers,” says the article.

Our Board of Legislators could avoid this harm simply by insisting that the WJWW project be sited outside of the Kensico Reservoir watershed.

Sierra Club, Purchase Environmental Protective Association, Purchase Friends Meeting, the Coalition to Prevent Westchester Airport Expansion and others oppose the WJWW project at the location planned, specifically because it is within the Kensico Reservoir watershed. 

We acknowledge WJWW’s need to build the treatment plant, but judge the risk of contamination by PFAS pollution to the water in the Kensico from soil and groundwater disturbance from the construction at this location is too great. However, the Board of Legislators judges this risk worth taking, considering the urgency of the project, which will benefit 80,000 - 100,000 people served by WJWW.

The 4/8/2024 vote was 15 in favor, 1 against, and 1 abstention. The legislator who voted against the project had concerns about the water in the Kensico Reservoir.

An ounce of prevention would surely go a long way here, considering the risk to public health and to the public’s wallet.

We are continuing our efforts against this project.

The Examiner News did a good article on the situation: Read Article

If you would like to pitch in, please email me at lowerhudson@gmail.com.

by George Klein