NEWBURGH – It has been 10 years since it was discovered that the City of Newburgh’s water supply – Washington Lake – was contaminated with the ‘forever chemical’ PFAS and a member of the Restoration Advisory Board is totally frustrated by what he calls the lack of action.
Ronald Zorrilla is a city councilman who is a representative on the board, and he is concerned that the Department of defense has pushed back the timeline for a study of the conditions until 2051.
“Another generation is going to grow up with the uncertainty, and this is just for the remedial investigation; it’s not even a cleanup effort or anything like that, just an investigation to see what options we have,” he said. “It is really frustrating to have a community board that exists, supposedly to engage with the community directly from the Department of Defense and we find out through newspapers that this cleanup effort or investigation is going to be extended 25 years.”
Washington Lake was taken offline since the contamination discovery and the state is paying for Newburgh to secure its water from the New York City aqueduct system.
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