TCEQ putting residents’ health, water at risk
On May 9, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality held a public meeting on a request by America’s second-largest homebuilder — Lennar Homes — to allow its partner — Municipal Operations LLC — to build a wastewater treatment plant that will discharge between 1 million and 4 million gallons of effluent each day into Helotes Creek on the Guajolote Ranch outside San Antonio.
That impure water will eventually fall through porous rock and end up in the Edwards Aquifer, which provides drinking water for 2 million residents who live in and around San Antonio.
Astonishingly, TCEQ officials openly acknowledged that neither they nor the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had determined the degree to which “emerging contaminants” would adversely impact human health.
Treatment plants like the one in question are not equipped to sufficiently filter out these “emerging contaminants,” which include pharmaceuticals like painkillers (think fentanyl) or synthetic hormones, and toxic chemicals found in lawn care (think Roundup) or household cleaning products, all of which have been proven to kill aquatic and animal life.
Despite that proven science has yet to conclusively affirm these chemicals are safe for human consumption, or that Lennar’s and Municipal Operations’ filtration technology can adequately remove the toxins they plan to dump, TCEQ is moving ahead with the permit approval process as if all is well.
In short, TCEQ is willing to violate its own mission statement, which says it “strives to protect our state’s public health and natural resources consistent with sustainable economic development.”
“Our goal is clean air, clean water, and the safe management of waste,” it says.
Why would TCEQ risk the health and safety of millions of residents by letting Lennar and Municipal Operations dump dangerous chemicals with unknown health consequences into our drinking water? Should all three entities be allowed to play Russian roulette not with their lives but ours?
TCEQ has a duty to err on the side of caution, not carelessness, to prevent thousands of innocent men, women and children from needless suffering.