Upstate residents suing over water contamination spread awareness in social media campaign

The fear spread across an upstate town struck by a terrifying water crisis can be seen on the faces of residents in a new social media campaign.

Stark black and white photos of the residents of Hoosick Falls, in Rensselaer County, fill the Twitter and Facebook feeds of the PFOA Project NY.

Each resident holds a sign announcing the results of blood tests showing how much perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), a chemical linked to cancer, is in their bodies.

“I’m only six ... can you ignore that???,” reads a sign held up by Corey Aldrich.

Nationwide readings average 2.08 ppb, compared with a 23.5 average in Hoosick Falls. The average level of the toxic chemical in the blood of 2,000 Hoosick Falls residents was about 10 times that of the general population, the state Health Department said.

Corey’s 4-year-old sister, Alyssa, holds a sign revealing a PFOA level of 117 ppb.

Studies have shown PFOA has been linked to kidney and testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease and other ailments.

Some Hoosick Falls residents have filed a class action lawsuit filed against Honeywell International and Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics, the companies that currently own the manufacturing plants identified by state investigators as the most likely sources of the contamination.

Department of Environmental Conservation officials recently announced that they had reached consent orders with both companies that will require them to initiate and pay for cleanup of several sites in and around Hoosick Falls. But others want answers from lawmakers about when officials knew the town’s water was unsafe and what they plan to do about it.

 

Politico reported last week that state officials and others knew the water was tainted with PFOA long before the public was told they should stop drinking the water.

The state has overseen installation of a temporary filtration system on the Hoosick Falls municipal water supply, and filters at homes where private well contamination was confirmed.

One of the first photos posted on the PFOA Project NY feed was of resident Loreen Hackett, who revealed a shocking PFOA level of 266 ppb. “Gee ... thanks,” Hackett’s sign reads.