UPDATE: Suggestions repeatedly made to Valero Energy in the past 10 years. These comments have eluded Valero Energy when plant officials requested suggestions for community projects to contribute to. The need for a skate board park and bicycle trail head comes to mind.
With a lack of public input mechanisms to suggest community projects, perhaps it’s worth reiterating
previously requested projects:
1) The
Villere Plantation's brick drainage pump ruins have been entrusted, through a conservation easement to the St.
Bernard Parish Historical Society. Unfortunately, the conservation
easement is scheduled to expire when the EPA CD is completed. This
wooded area on the former
Villere Plantation grounds would make a wonderful bird and wildlife
sanctuary. Bald eagles are known to nest in this area. It would also be a
suitable location for a Central Wetlands observation deck north of the forty
arpent canal.
The Villere Plantation was the site of the British Invasion
during the war of 1812. The
Villere Plantation was listed as a War of 1812 Preservation Priority in the
2007 American Battlefield Protection Program Report to Congress. "The
priorities indicate which sites, in the opinion of the National Park Service,
merit immediate preservation action, which need ongoing preservation action,
which require additional study, and which are best suited for commemoration
rather than preservation." http://www.nps.gov/hps/abpp/Rev1812_Final_Report.pdf http://concernedcitizensaroundmurphy.blogspot.com/2011/04/villere-plantation-ruins.html
2) Buy Back Program;
allow homeowners to increase lot sizes
and give residents the opportunity of re-establishing our neighborhood
feel. Place conservation easement on the
remaining land titles to provide commitment to a truly protective green zone
buffer.
3) Protect our
children and pedestrians and resume the sidewalk replacement program to bring vacant
lots to ADA compliance. Include the sidewalks from Ohio Street to Jacob Drive
so residents can safely continue to ride bikes or walk along Jacob Drive. http://concernedcitizensaroundmurphy.blogspot.com/2014/08/sidewalks-and-school-children.html
4) Respect our families and our privacy and stop
neighborhood surveillance tactics and invasive security cameras. Keep transient
workers from trespassing, and provide workers with an evacuation route which
does not include our neighborhoods.
5) Improvements to
increase the plant’s storm water capacity and to change the plan for waste
water malfunctions, so that use of neighborhood canals for emergency discharges
or overflows is prohibited. Additionally
prohibit use of the plant’s western rain water ditch for waste water
malfunctions. This “west ditch” connects to the municipal storm water system
which discharges into the nearby central wetlands.
6) Appropriately fill
the vacant lots to avoid mosquito infestation and virus transmission.
7) Provide public access to real time fence line monitor
data, especially for benzene (not two week averages with data available months
later). Continue the ambient air monitor station and real time access to its
data beyond the EPA CD conclusion. Provide public access to the rain fall
totals measured at the station.
8) Provide real time information during plant emergencies
and other incidents.
9) Investments to upgrade the Meraux plant to BACT pollution
controls.
10) Investment in operational adjustments for noise muffling
and installation of noise abatement technology.
11) Comply with our local code and performance standards for
nuisance, vibrations, noise, dust, night work, truck traffic, screening fences,
dumpsters and parking lot litter.
12) A good neighbor demonstrates respect on a daily basis
for the people who live on the other side of the fence line. Merge the CAP and the emissions data meeting
to allow the general public to attend its CAP meetings and allow information
from CAP meetings to be made available to the public.
