Mon, 09 Aug 1999

The Alberton Community Coalition for Environmental Health, or ACCEH, is

advising chemical exposure victims from the 1996 Montana Rail Link train

derailment and chemical spill not to participate in the upcoming ATSDR and AOEC free

medical screening. In a letter dated April 30th, 1999, ACCEH Board Members went

on the record opposing further studies and requested that,"...the

implementation of the current draft protocol for the ATSDR Health Intervention Plan be

postponed till any and all new information and facts that develop from the

independent review can be considered and acted upon."

The independent review is currently being conducted by EPA Ombudsman,

Robert Martin. A formal petition was initiated in the winter of 1998 by ACCEH

And supported by the community, with the endorsement of Senator Max Baucus.

In his letter to Ombudsman Robert Martin, Senator Max Baucus states, "The

community is concerned that they did not and do not have sufficient information

regarding the nature of the material that was released, and risks posed

by that material, because efforts by the Environmental Protection Agency and the

Agency for Toxic Substance and Disease Registry have focused principally

On the release of chlorine. This has hampered efforts to diagnose and treat symptoms that may not be attributable to

chlorine exposure, and to take necessary precautions against continued exposure."

Lucinda Hodges, Director of ACCEH, states that, "To move forward based

On bad science is to further waste federal tax dollars. We need logical

implementation of government resources at this site. More than three

years later we still have people digging in their gardens in the hot zone and

getting sick from exposure to their own soil! We need to identify the residual

environmental contaminants and move beyond the myth that this was a

chlorine only spill. ATSDR has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in

Alberton, MT, all of it based on bad science. Not one sick child has

Been helped in over three years.

A free medical screening with no funding for treatment or follow up care is not a solution, it is a travesty."

Alberton Community Coalition for Environmental Health

Director, Lucinda Hodges, phone/fax 406-728-7572

P. O. Box 8733 Missoula, MT 59807

ACCEH is a grassroots, chemical injury advocacy group, that formed after

the April 11th, 1996, train derailment and chemical spill in response to the acute

injury and needs of the survivors of this chemical disaster.

Please sign the Alberton Community Coalition for Environmental Health's (ACCEH) Petition