MILFORD — Activists turned out in force on Wednesday to castigate a Wixom auto supplier responsible for overwhelming the city wastewater system with a toxic chemical release that sparked a ‘no contact’ advisory with the Huron River.
The crowd at Heavner Canoe Rental in Milford was angry and it showed. Signs urged punitive actions against Tribar Technologies for releasing hexavalent chromium into the river this month and PFAS into the river in recent years.
“Tribar is toxic,” “Choke on your own chromium,” “Dump toxins down river, do time up the river,” “Two strikes, you’re out” and “Polluters must pay” were among the slogans.
One, a painted canoe paddle, read, simply: “WTF.”
“It wasn’t four years ago they dumped toxic PFAS in our river,” state Rep. Yousef Rabhi, a Democrat from Ann Arbor, yelled to the agitated crowd.
“They made it so we couldn’t eat the fish. They made it so we had fear all across our city about the water coming out of our tap. People weren’t able to use the river. How is it in just four short years we’re back in the same place, with the same company? How can that be allowed?”
“They need to be shut down. They need to be held accountable — GM, Ford, every single manufacturer needs to stop doing business with them,” Rabhi continued.
“I want them sued into oblivion.”
Chants of “shut them down!” filled the air as several speakers drew a line between Tribar’s toxic spill and the need to strengthen environmental regulations in Michigan to ensure such releases, which have occurred in Flint, Sault Ste. Marie and Flat Rock already this year, finally stop.
“Why is it taxpayers have to pay to clean up the mess that some company made — for profit!” said Rabhi, his voice rising to an angry shout. “They benefited from the pollution that they put in our river! They made money off of our lives!”
The Wednesday, Aug. 10 rally punctuated a day of revelations about what transpired 13 days prior at Tribar on Friday, July 29, when the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) says a surge of contaminated industrial wastewater rushed into the city of Wixom’s wastewater plant from what the company reported as an “operator error.”
Less than a half hour before the noon rally began, EGLE announced an “accelerated enforcement” process against Tribar which will involve administrative consent negotiations and attempts to recover costs incurred by the state.
The announcement included violation notices sent to Tribar, in which EGLE demanded answers about how and why a now-former employee overrode the waste treatment alarms 460 times in the span of nearly three hours between about 5 and 7:45 p.m. the night of the spill.
Tribar told media Wednesday that automated controls at its Plant No. 5 on Alpha Drive in Wixom were functioning normally while the factory was shut down for the weekend and that the employee who apparently released 10,000 gallons of “acid etch material” with about five percent total chromium was not authorized to be on-site after hours.
The employee quit on Monday, Aug. 1, Tribar said.
By then, the damage was done.
Thankfully, the damage may end up being less severe than initially feared. After a week of state testing for hexavalent chromium in the river between Wixom and Ann Arbor, only minimal amounts of the chemicals were detected, buoying optimism among officials that the contaminants were largely bound up in filters at both the Tribar and the Wixom plants.
EGLE said it turned over its testing data on Wednesday to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), which is expected to decide whether to continue the ‘no contact’ advisory in the coming days.
However, “a ‘crisis averted’ is hardly a good news situation,” said Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin in a statement read by an aide at the Wednesday rally.
Slotkin, whose district includes parts of the river and its watershed, called for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set a national standard for hexavalent chromium, which is not regulated in drinking water although other forms, such as total chromium, are.
Hexavalent chromium, or hexchrome, is a carcinogenic chemical used in manufacturing. It can cause a number of health problems through ingestion, skin contact or inhalation.
“Water is our gift in Michigan, and as we gather here during the peak of summer recreation season, spills like these have health, environmental, economic, and national security consequences,” Slotkin stated. “I’m calling on local leaders to get to the bottom of why this happened, and to apply the most aggressive enforcement action available.”
“If we need new laws to go after polluters and repeat offenders in Michigan, then our state lawmakers need to get to work.”
Dave Woodward, chair of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners, said the county is going to put its “full weight and political power” behind polluter pay legislation in Lansing.
“We need to up the game,” Woodward said. “We’re going to invest the resources to build the lobbying strength to coordinate with all of our local communities to lift up our collective voices to be able to do this because we know that what happened here can never be allowed to happen again.”
Rabhi and others urged the crowd to call lawmakers and demand a hearing on House Bill 4314, which would require that companies clean up pollution “to the extent technically feasible” under the “most stringent cleanup criteria.”
The bill, which has a Senate version sponsored by Sen. Jeff Irwin, would change the allowance for polluters to limit cleanups by restricting public access to contaminated sites.
Rabhi said a version of the bills have been introduced in each legislative session and fail to receive a committee hearing due to aggressive lobbying against them by the Michigan Manufacturers Association and the Michigan Chamber of Commerce, which are consistently reliable voices in opposition to additional environmental regulations in Michigan.
The business groups and Republicans in control of committee schedules say the proposed bills would hamper redevelopment of contaminated sites and do not allow for variations in cleanup levels between residential or industrial site uses.
The bills have yet to land a committee hearing in either the Senate Committee on Environmental Quality or the House Natural Resources and Outdoor Recreation Committee. They were introduced in late January and late February this year.
At the rally, automakers were also urged to cut ties with Tribar.
The Ecology Center in Ann Arbor began circulating an online petition this week calling on the CEOs of Ford, Toyota, General Motors and Stellantis to stop using parts made with hexavalent chromium. Each are listed as customers on Tribar’s website.
In response to an inquiry from MLive, Ford spokeswoman Cathie Hargett said the company requires its suppliers to “comply with all relevant environmental regulations.”
“We’re following this situation and looking into this serious matter,” Hargett said.
Liz Winter, spokeswoman for General Motors, issued a similar statement.
“General Motors is committed to the sustainable and responsible sourcing of goods and services, and we are carefully reviewing the matter internally,” Winter wrote.
Related stories:
Tribar waste alarms overriden 460 times before spill
Dingell seeks greater EPA hand in Huron River spill
EGLE finds low hexchrome in river testing
Tests encouraging, but worry and anger remain
Hexchrome could take weeks to reach Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor council OK’s legal action toward Tribar
Wixom police investigate Tribar hexchrome spill
Non-contact with Huron River urged after spill
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