After the Boston Chemical Data company found levels of harmful radioactive waste in classrooms and the playground of a Florissant elementary school, the Hazelwood School District closed it and dispersed the children.
The 387 students who attended Jana Elementary School will start their studies anew today, on Nov. 28, in five various grade schools within the district.
“The reassignment was very sudden for the kids and difficult for parents,” said Karen Nickel, co-founder of the environmental advocacy parents’ group Just Moms STL. “Some kids who were walkers to school had to become bus riders. Bus service is provided, but that doesn't always work out for parents when you have older kids in other schools and your work schedule.”
Some of the preschool to 5th graders started at their newly assigned schools immediately rather than participating in remote learning, according to Nickel.
“I have heard reports of kids being bullied and being called radioactive,” she said. “So, this has been a huge strain on the Jana community. Jana kids aren’t radioactive just because toxic materials may have been found in the school.”
As previously reported, the evaluation was commissioned by law firms as part of a class action lawsuit.
Jana Elementary School, built in 1970, is adjacent to Coldwater Creek, which was named a superfund site in 1989. The Associated Press reported that the creek was allegedly contaminated as a result of nuclear weapons that were manufactured nearby during the time of World War 2.
But Nickel says cleaning up hasn’t progressed fast enough in 34 years.
“They've cleaned up about two miles of the creek and the creek is 14 miles long,” she said. “They have cleaned up four residential properties. That's it.”
The Army Corps of Engineers Formerly Utilized Sites Remediation Program (FUSRAP) did not immediately reply to requests for comment.
Although she moved away as an adult, Nickel remembers going to school in the Hazelwood School District along the banks of Cold Water Creek. Today, she lives in Maryland Heights where she’s raising her own four children.
“We know this has multi-generational effects,” Nickel told the St. Louis Record. “I have three autoimmune diseases… lupus, psoriatic arthritis, and Sjogren's. I have a four-year-old granddaughter who was born with a mass on her right ovary that had to be removed when she was three weeks old. My kids have been impacted.”
Nickel wants to see an expedited cleanup.
"The cleanup levels need to be changed," she said. "They need more manpower. They need more money."