NEW YORK—Council Member Eric Gioia scolded the giant multinational oil company Exxon for its negligence in cleaning up its largest oil spill. Gioia is a plaintiff in one of many lawsuits that have been filed against ExxonMobil due to the massive 17 million gallon Greenpoint oil spill into Newton Creek, a three-mile long waterway that separates Brooklyn and Queens and is a tributary of the East River, the Hudson River, and New York Harbor.
“It is disgraceful that, as our neighborhood suffers, the wealthiest company in the world stuffs money into their already bulging pockets. Just a tiny amount of Exxon’s record earnings could restore Newtown Creek to the pristine condition New Yorkers enjoyed before the oil companies came. Instead, Exxon [continues to] offer no timetable or budget for [cleaning up] the mess they created,” said Gioia. “Shame on Exxon.”
In the midst of a global economic recession, Exxon, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, announced last week that it had shattered profit records, taking in $45.22 billion in 2008. According to the press release, Exxon’s previous high was $40.61 billion in 2007. Despite their astronomical profits, Exxon continues to delay the cleanup of the creek despite many reports and scientific findings detailing the effects the contamination has had on the creek and the community.
“Exxon is out of excuses, it shouldn’t take a lawsuit for Exxon to do the right thing. They have the money—now they need to get to work,” said Gioia. “This is the definition of corporate irresponsibility.”
For more than half a century, this massive oil spill has been lying underneath the industrial areas and edging nearby residential areas surrounding Newton Creek. The Greenpoint oil spill is 50 percent larger than the Exxon Valdez disaster that happened in Alaska’s coastal waters.
The plaintiffs of these lawsuits believe that ExxonMobil is dumping toxic waste directly into Newton Creek with no required Federal Clean Water Act permit, which they once had. According to a 2007 press release the company requested that the State Department of Environmental Conservation terminate their permits and let them continue under an “equivalency” program.
“Every day that ExxonMobil discharges pollutants out of these pipes, it’s in violation of Federal law,” said Riverkeeper president Alex Matthiesson. “The state’s equivalency program as applied here allows the company to avoid many political provisions such as periodic five year reviews.” Riverkeeper is the Hudson River’s chief citizen-based pollution enforcement organization.
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