“Who named it the arsenic pond?”
Olancha (Olancha!) turns out en masse for Crystal Geyser hearing.
No one knows why Crystal Geyser Roxanne didn’t get a permit to dispose of arsenic into an un-lined pond, or why no one caught the arsenic seeping out of the pond and into the soil and groundwater, or what exactly is going to be done about it. This was the biggest take away from the Wednesday, March 2 meeting held in Olancha to discuss the contamination and what steps Roxanne, Inyo County and Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board are doing about the problem. The meeting drew a big crowd, nearly 100. Not bad for a community of about 300.
Wednesday’s meeting was the first time the contamination has been addressed since first discovered in 2013, violations were handed down by Lahontan in May 2015. The disposal ponds, used as a trash can for materials leeched out of the spring water before bottling, are not licensed by Lahontan, nor are they constructed sufficiently enough to handle the toxic material being dumped in them. Lahontan has been conducting a three phase investigation. According to Scott Ferguson, chief watershed officer at Lahontan, Roxanne is complying with the investigation.
