Greenaction works with our community partners to demand that polluters and government agencies promptly and safely remediate and clean up toxic and radioactive contamination threatening public health and the environment. Clean up/remediation of contamination sites must be done with full community oversight. Government must use not use corporate contractors in cleanup who have been involved in fraud and/or inadequate cleanups and remediation of sites.
Where necessary, residents should be offered temporary or permanent relocation away from the contaminated areas.
Where contamination can be safely and properly remediated on site, that is a good option that protects local residents as well as communities living next to waste disposal landfills and incinerators. If contamination cannot be treated safely on site and/or it is not safe to leave it in place (such as where rising sea levels threaten to inundate contamination), then the waste should be sent to a landfill with the least environmental health and justice impacts, and one that is operating with current permits based on legitimate environmental reviews.
Tools and Resources on Sea Level Rise and Shoreline Contamination
The document below is a compilation of resources pertaining to sea level rise and contaminated sites from various government agencies, academic institutions, and community organizations around the San Francisco Bay and state-wide. These resources include tools such as databases from government agencies and academic institutions, government and academic reports on sea-level rise and contaminated sites around the Bay, community-based and grassroots organizations, coalitions, and non-profit organizations that are currently working to address this issue of sea-level rise and shoreline contamination in the Bay Area. Additionally, this page includes a list of local and state government agencies that have jurisdiction over contaminated sites around the Bay and academic institutions that are involved in this work. Finally, a compilation of grants and other funding opportunities for communities and local governments to address this critical issue is provided at the end of this document.
This document is intended to create an accessible space where communities can learn more about the issue of sea-level rise and contaminated sites around the San Francisco Bay. Please feel free to use and share this resource with others.
Access the Tools and Resources document here.
Campaigns and Programs
Greenaction Petitions to Revoke Tetra Tech’s National and State Radiological Licenses
Greenaction is challenging the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, USEPA and the State of California to stop awarding contracts to Tetra Tech or their subsidiaries due to the massive fraud committed at the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard Superfund Site in San Francisco, inadequate cleanup at Treasure Island, and allegations of fraud in the Sonoma County, California fire cleanup.
Read our petition to revoke Tetra Tech’s national and state radiological licenses
Cleanup Hunters Point Shipyard Superfund Site
Greenaction is working with our community partners, the Golden Gate University Law School Environmental Law and Justice Clinic, and whistleblowers to watchdog and advocate for full retesting and a proper cleanup of the radioactive and toxic contamination resulting from decades of reckless military and industrial operations. We are also working with residents for comprehensive testing, with independent community oversight, of “Parcel A” – the area incorrectly declared clean by the government and Tetra Tech over a decade ago, where three hundred upscale townhouses were built, and where radioactive equipment was recently discovered.
Read more about Bayview Hunters Point Community
Stop the BUILD LLC Mega-Development, and Conduct Proper Toxic Cleanup of India Basin
- India Basin, Bayview Hunters Point, San Francisco, CA
Greenaction is leading the fight against corporate developer BUILD LLC’s plan to build upscale housing on land still contaminated and located adjacent to the Shipyard Superfund Site. BUILD initially claimed that the only hazardous waste at the site was “some old paint cans.” We want the BUILD LLC site fully cleaned up to protect nearby residents and San Francisco Bay from the contamination and rising sea levels. In response to Greenaction’s watchdogging and advocacy, San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department is moving ahead with comprehensive cleanup of the India Basin Shoreline Park.
March 19, 2019 San Francisco Examiner news story
Read more about India Basin Appeal
Read the India Basin Health and Pollution Warning
Greenaction Presentation on India Basin Mixed Use Development
Greenaction Comments on Environmental Impact Report for India Basin Mixed Use Development
Greenaction Letter to Bay Area Air Quality Management District regarding violation of civil rights
Read USEPA Region 9 Report, “Targeted Brownfields Assessment Bayview Hunters Point Industrial Area Brownfields Project, San Francisco, California (2012)
Treasure Island Cleanup & Community Relocation
Low income people of color in subsidized housing live feet from, and likely on top of, radioactive and hazardous wastes from the former Navy base on Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay. Not only is the area heavily contaminated with radioactive and toxic waste, but the “cleanup” has been inadequate and reckless. Concerns include uncovered piles of radioactive waste, broken fences at contaminated areas, lead paint blowing off of buildings, rising sea levels threatening to inundate contamination, completely lax government oversight of the cleanup, and the fact that Tetra Tech performed a lot of the work here. Greenaction is working with residents to demand comprehensive retesting of the entire area, improved cleanup with improved regulatory agency oversight – and independent community oversight. We also demand that residents wanting to be relocated be provided relocation funds and new housing, with full rent control at their current rent level.
Read more on Treasure Island
Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice Presentation to SFBOS Treasure Island Feb 8, 2021
SF’s Treasure Island, Poised for Building Boom, Escaped Listing as Superfund Site. Read the San Francisco Chronicle New Story here.
Cleanup “Pure Gro” Pesticide Contamination Site
Greenaction is working with our partner Comite Civico del Valle to demand that Chevron and the state Department of Toxic Substances Control remove the pesticide contamination from the former Pure Gro facility in Brawley California that is adjacent to homes.
Read more on Imperial Valley page
Read Greenaction letter to DTSC
Cleanup AMCO Chemical Superfund Site
Greenaction and our partners at the West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project continue to watchdog the final phase of the remediation of the AMCO site. In 2004, Greenaction and the community group Chester Street Block Club Association succeeded in getting USEPA to place this site on the federal National Priorities List/Superfund. In 1998 Greenaction alerted residents that USEPA was incinerating the contamination, and lying about the emissions. We forced EPA to stop burning the waste, which was emitting dioxin, vinyl chloride and other toxics into the air and homes. We worked patiently and diligently for years to get USEPA to work with Greenaction and WOEIP and other residents to identify the safest way to treat the contaminated groundwater, and the cleanup is nearly complete and has been done safely.
Read more on the West Oakland Community Page
Midway Village Community
Greenaction continues supporting residents of this public housing project built on top of a PG&E toxic contamination site in Daly City, California. Residents have suffered a wide range of health problems, with contamination under and next to their homes and at the adjacent PG&E facility causing ongoing problems.
Living on Toxic Ground / After 10-year battle, Daly City residents finally being heard