Nearly half a century after the Love Canal disaster turned Niagara Falls into the symbol of America’s worst environmental catastrophe, a growing contamination crisis in Niagara County involving radioactive materials is already forced families from their homes.
Four Town of Niagara households have been offered relocation after government testing found elevated levels of radioactive contamination on their properties, including one backyard where environmental officials recorded Geiger counter readings reaching approximately 900,000 counts per second.
That’s really, really high.
Developments over the past several days have intensified questions about the response – or lack of response – from Governor Kathy Hochul’s administration, particularly because the state has been involved in investigating the contamination for years. While the governor says her administration is acting quickly and transparently, residents continue asking why the investigation progressed for years before emergency relocations became necessary and why many property owners still have not been provided with the survey data that prompted the government to target their homes for additional testing…