by Elizabeth Cook
I ventured down to Lafitte on Tuesday, January 11th, 2011 to hear residents "question" Feinberg, the well-heeled and well-connected attorney in charge of the distribution process for the $20 billion BP fund to residents impacted by the spill. Confrontation though, was more the tone of the meeting. BP pays Feinberg's salary of $850 thousand, so the huge question of conflict of interest is indeed the elephant in any room in which he appears, claiming to represent the "clients" or victims of this oil disaster.
Feinberg is the attorney who worked out the deal for 911 family survivors. He came into this scenario with a reputation of bridging differences and smoothing over enmity in large disaster type scenarios. I'm betting he did not fully gauge how difficult this was going to be. How do you "smooth over" hurt feelings and lives destroyed, a way of life destroyed, possibly for generations? How do you smooth over the feelings and needs of those who signed up to help clean this up, and were treated to no protection from toxic chemicals, refused respirators, exposed to toxic dispersants that shouldn't have been used, and are now showing high levels of toxic chemicals in their blood stream? How do you smooth over the anger of residents of the Gulf coast who are showing high levels of toxic chemicals when their blood is tested?
All of these issues came up at least once in Lafitte, and from viewing tapes of Feinberg in Bay St. Louis, elsewhere as well. Blood showing toxicity, fears of what the future will bring regarding fisheries, damned if you do take the settlement, damned if you don't kinds of frustration expressed. The room at the City Park multi-plex center was standing room only, packed with several hundred fishermen, women and their families, activists and observers. I couldn't enter the rear door because people were spilling out of the room so I went around the side with my camera and they let me in up front under the auspices of needing access to film the event. I did film the entire event except for a few words at the beginning. Politicians sat up front, including Jefferson Parish Pres. John Young, Lafitte mayor, former Congressman Coa, now working for Feinberg to represent the Vietnamese community.
One fisher-woman said they are drum fishermen, and there are no more drum fish in the waters. Are they eligible for a settlement? Yes, but they would have to get a letter from the state stating the drum are gone from the waters, Feinberg said. Catch 22. The state won't release any such letter because they have been given millions of dollars to promote their seafood and tourism from BP, the same company paying Feinberg to give these ridiculous suggestions.
One woman confronted Feinberg on his salary, and Feinberg replied, without a touch of cynicism, that he felt we were all fortunate that BP has agreed to pay for this process.
Fishermen reported lights and water cut off, barely having enough funds with which to eat. One African American fisherman got down on his knees asking for help with which to feed his family and pay his bills. Needless to say, he got the classic line from Feinberg, "I will personally look into this". Claims are not being payed in a timely manner to residents who are desperate, and even if paid, there is the fear of the future: what is to happen to this way of life, this fishing, shrimping, harvesting oysters, charter boats, sports fishermen who fed their families from their catches (they are eligible for a claim, Feinberg said). If you take the full claim, you surrender your right to sue, a violation of human rights by any measure.
Although most of the closed fishing areas have been reopened, and folks are encouraged to eat the seafood, the shrimpers are reporting there is little shrimp to catch, and many refuse to eat their own catch. I'm giving you this as backup to the lack of trust there now is on the Gulf coast, and that is an understatement. Truth is, many on the coast feel that their government is content to sacrifice their lives and health to coverup the extent of the damage to our Gulf waters.
Ironically, even Feinberg at this hearing admitted we don't know the long term impacts of the spill on Gulf waters. Yet we are all encouraged to eat the seafood from those same waters. If long term impacts could be detrimental, doesn't that then mean that short term impacts are also possibly detrimental? Yet there is no regular and adequate testing at this time of Gulf waters, of the toxicity of the water, to determine if it is even safe to fish. Louisiana Environmental Action Network, with Dr. Wilma Subra, has recently published testing of blood and seafood. Not good news. You can view the results at www.leanweb.org.
It's hard for me to imagine our government encouraging folks to eat seafood from waters within which there is speculation there will be a massive fisheries collapse, as was in the Exxon Valdez disaster, four years later.
Clint Guidry, secretary for the Louisiana shrimper's Association, asked the first question at the Feinberg hearing. Guidry has gotten away from his most impassioned activism at the beginning of the spill, when he spoke passionately against the use of dispersant. His position is more one of trying to negotiate the best possible position for his shrimpers in terms of the monies they should be receiving from BP, and the price of shrimp. Yes, Mr. Guidry did tell me he has petitioned the EPA on the dispersant issue. I have to say that anyone arguing that shrimpers should be payed a higher price for shrimp, or arguing that perhaps additional testing would clear up fears over tainted seafood, is in denial. I see Guidry in some kind of denial phase. I don't blame Guidry for this. He is doing what he feels is right for his people, but they are in an impossible, Orwellian situation, placed there by our government. The Gulf waters, based on LEAN and Subra's testing, should be declared unfit waters for fishing, and additional, massive testing should be taking place. The government though won't do this because it is admitting the dispersant was a terrible mistake, and it would mean additional pressures on BP, something the government appears loath to do.
The question must be asked, also, as folks advocate for their shrimping industry, how can people be encouraged to eat Gulf seafood from an area in which residents are becoming seriously ill?
At the Oil Spill Commission Hearing the next day, Wednesday, January 12th, several activists, including myself, were forceful in pushing the health effects front and center of any discussion, and we succeeded in having, for example, the Times Picayune article focused on the health effects. Cherri Foytlin, James "Catfish" Miller, CJ Troxclair, Robin Young from Alabama and Riki Ott spoke forcefully regarding the health effects they and others are suffering, and the suffering of others on the coast, including participants of the Vessels of Opportunity (VOO) program. Robin Young asked, "Where is the urgency?" We hear the CDC is conducting a study. In the meantime, folks are slowly dying, children have been poisoned, Cherri spoke of children with lesions. No one is offering the health care and testing needed to adequately gauge what is happening.
Recent scientific testing of phytoplankton in Gulf waters, information culled from an article written by Naomi Klein for the Nation magazine, reveal frightening evidence of genetic mutations that could lead to tumors and cancer in the phytoplankton, and ultimately fisheries collapse. In addition, these mutations may be a "heritable", and passed on to succeeding generations of phytoplankton. Obviously, scientists are just beginning to get a glimpse as to the damage this disaster has wrought on our Gulf ecosystem. To allow fisheries to remain open at this time is simply unconscionable.
In the meantime, oil continues to wash up, most recently on Grand Isle, Perdido Key, Florida, and Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Residents continue to report strong chemical smells for example, in Longbeach and Ocean Springs, Mississippi, and the lack of life in the waters. These same residents believe that dispersant is still being sprayed.
Dispersant as coverup, neglect as coverup. Neglect the issue, don't give it the attention, time and energy it deserves, and it will remain below the radar of the national corporate news apparatus. If the government expresses concern and adequately addresses the health issues, then it essentially uncovers its own blunders, poor judgement as in the unregulated use of dispersant, and the premature reopening of fisheries. The government has created a Catch 22 of its own making. Lies lead to the need for more lies, and it never ends.
It is the people of the Gulf coast who will ultimately bring this issue to justice.
Elizabeth Cook
I ventured down to Lafitte on Tuesday, January 11th, 2011 to hear residents "question" Feinberg, the well-heeled and well-connected attorney in charge of the distribution process for the $20 billion BP fund to residents impacted by the spill. Confrontation though, was more the tone of the meeting. BP pays Feinberg's salary of $850 thousand, so the huge question of conflict of interest is indeed the elephant in any room in which he appears, claiming to represent the "clients" or victims of this oil disaster.
Feinberg is the attorney who worked out the deal for 911 family survivors. He came into this scenario with a reputation of bridging differences and smoothing over enmity in large disaster type scenarios. I'm betting he did not fully gauge how difficult this was going to be. How do you "smooth over" hurt feelings and lives destroyed, a way of life destroyed, possibly for generations? How do you smooth over the feelings and needs of those who signed up to help clean this up, and were treated to no protection from toxic chemicals, refused respirators, exposed to toxic dispersants that shouldn't have been used, and are now showing high levels of toxic chemicals in their blood stream? How do you smooth over the anger of residents of the Gulf coast who are showing high levels of toxic chemicals when their blood is tested?
All of these issues came up at least once in Lafitte, and from viewing tapes of Feinberg in Bay St. Louis, elsewhere as well. Blood showing toxicity, fears of what the future will bring regarding fisheries, damned if you do take the settlement, damned if you don't kinds of frustration expressed. The room at the City Park multi-plex center was standing room only, packed with several hundred fishermen, women and their families, activists and observers. I couldn't enter the rear door because people were spilling out of the room so I went around the side with my camera and they let me in up front under the auspices of needing access to film the event. I did film the entire event except for a few words at the beginning. Politicians sat up front, including Jefferson Parish Pres. John Young, Lafitte mayor, former Congressman Coa, now working for Feinberg to represent the Vietnamese community.
One fisher-woman said they are drum fishermen, and there are no more drum fish in the waters. Are they eligible for a settlement? Yes, but they would have to get a letter from the state stating the drum are gone from the waters, Feinberg said. Catch 22. The state won't release any such letter because they have been given millions of dollars to promote their seafood and tourism from BP, the same company paying Feinberg to give these ridiculous suggestions.
One woman confronted Feinberg on his salary, and Feinberg replied, without a touch of cynicism, that he felt we were all fortunate that BP has agreed to pay for this process.
Fishermen reported lights and water cut off, barely having enough funds with which to eat. One African American fisherman got down on his knees asking for help with which to feed his family and pay his bills. Needless to say, he got the classic line from Feinberg, "I will personally look into this". Claims are not being payed in a timely manner to residents who are desperate, and even if paid, there is the fear of the future: what is to happen to this way of life, this fishing, shrimping, harvesting oysters, charter boats, sports fishermen who fed their families from their catches (they are eligible for a claim, Feinberg said). If you take the full claim, you surrender your right to sue, a violation of human rights by any measure.
Although most of the closed fishing areas have been reopened, and folks are encouraged to eat the seafood, the shrimpers are reporting there is little shrimp to catch, and many refuse to eat their own catch. I'm giving you this as backup to the lack of trust there now is on the Gulf coast, and that is an understatement. Truth is, many on the coast feel that their government is content to sacrifice their lives and health to coverup the extent of the damage to our Gulf waters.
Ironically, even Feinberg at this hearing admitted we don't know the long term impacts of the spill on Gulf waters. Yet we are all encouraged to eat the seafood from those same waters. If long term impacts could be detrimental, doesn't that then mean that short term impacts are also possibly detrimental? Yet there is no regular and adequate testing at this time of Gulf waters, of the toxicity of the water, to determine if it is even safe to fish. Louisiana Environmental Action Network, with Dr. Wilma Subra, has recently published testing of blood and seafood. Not good news. You can view the results at www.leanweb.org.
It's hard for me to imagine our government encouraging folks to eat seafood from waters within which there is speculation there will be a massive fisheries collapse, as was in the Exxon Valdez disaster, four years later.
Clint Guidry, secretary for the Louisiana shrimper's Association, asked the first question at the Feinberg hearing. Guidry has gotten away from his most impassioned activism at the beginning of the spill, when he spoke passionately against the use of dispersant. His position is more one of trying to negotiate the best possible position for his shrimpers in terms of the monies they should be receiving from BP, and the price of shrimp. Yes, Mr. Guidry did tell me he has petitioned the EPA on the dispersant issue. I have to say that anyone arguing that shrimpers should be payed a higher price for shrimp, or arguing that perhaps additional testing would clear up fears over tainted seafood, is in denial. I see Guidry in some kind of denial phase. I don't blame Guidry for this. He is doing what he feels is right for his people, but they are in an impossible, Orwellian situation, placed there by our government. The Gulf waters, based on LEAN and Subra's testing, should be declared unfit waters for fishing, and additional, massive testing should be taking place. The government though won't do this because it is admitting the dispersant was a terrible mistake, and it would mean additional pressures on BP, something the government appears loath to do.
The question must be asked, also, as folks advocate for their shrimping industry, how can people be encouraged to eat Gulf seafood from an area in which residents are becoming seriously ill?
At the Oil Spill Commission Hearing the next day, Wednesday, January 12th, several activists, including myself, were forceful in pushing the health effects front and center of any discussion, and we succeeded in having, for example, the Times Picayune article focused on the health effects. Cherri Foytlin, James "Catfish" Miller, CJ Troxclair, Robin Young from Alabama and Riki Ott spoke forcefully regarding the health effects they and others are suffering, and the suffering of others on the coast, including participants of the Vessels of Opportunity (VOO) program. Robin Young asked, "Where is the urgency?" We hear the CDC is conducting a study. In the meantime, folks are slowly dying, children have been poisoned, Cherri spoke of children with lesions. No one is offering the health care and testing needed to adequately gauge what is happening.
Recent scientific testing of phytoplankton in Gulf waters, information culled from an article written by Naomi Klein for the Nation magazine, reveal frightening evidence of genetic mutations that could lead to tumors and cancer in the phytoplankton, and ultimately fisheries collapse. In addition, these mutations may be a "heritable", and passed on to succeeding generations of phytoplankton. Obviously, scientists are just beginning to get a glimpse as to the damage this disaster has wrought on our Gulf ecosystem. To allow fisheries to remain open at this time is simply unconscionable.
In the meantime, oil continues to wash up, most recently on Grand Isle, Perdido Key, Florida, and Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Residents continue to report strong chemical smells for example, in Longbeach and Ocean Springs, Mississippi, and the lack of life in the waters. These same residents believe that dispersant is still being sprayed.
Dispersant as coverup, neglect as coverup. Neglect the issue, don't give it the attention, time and energy it deserves, and it will remain below the radar of the national corporate news apparatus. If the government expresses concern and adequately addresses the health issues, then it essentially uncovers its own blunders, poor judgement as in the unregulated use of dispersant, and the premature reopening of fisheries. The government has created a Catch 22 of its own making. Lies lead to the need for more lies, and it never ends.
It is the people of the Gulf coast who will ultimately bring this issue to justice.
Elizabeth Cook
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