Dear Editor,
It is only right that Vermont officials recently have been reaching out to our Quebec neighbors and allies in an effort to strengthen relationships shredded by recent words and actions of our president and our homeland security secretary.
There is nothing funny or acceptable about referring to Canada as “the 51st state” or requiring Quebec patrons to use the back door of the international Haskell Library in Derby Line instead of the main entrance as enjoyed by Stanstead residents for over a century.
What more significant gesture of concern and respect for our northern neighbors could there be than to immediately make permanent the current moratorium on disposal or discharge of landfill leachate, “treated “ or not, anywhere in the international Memphremagog watershed?
Lake Memphremagog is the drinking water reservoir of more than 175,000 residents of the Eastern Townships. Sampling and analysis by the ANR of surface waters, fish tissues and wastewater effluent revealed unacceptable levels of PFOS, a chemical with no known safe level of exposure. Other contaminants of concern also enter our lake waters every day.
If the waters of Lake Memphremagog flowed from north to south, threatening the drinking water of so many thousands of Vermont citizens, Vermonters would expect nothing less than immediate action by Quebec to protect the health and safety of our citizens.
A permanent ban, to the maximum extent possible, on chemical contamination of Lake Memphremagog is an action that would speak volumes and swiftly restore Quebec’s faith in our mutually respectful and beneficial relationship.
There is a bill right now in the House Environment Committee, H.113, a bill that would draft a crisis response plan, assessing pollutants of concern and ways to mitigate them. It deserves action now.
Peggy Stevens
(member of the advisory committee for DUMP — Don’t Undermine Memphremagog’s Purity)
Charleston
