Thursday, September 8, 2016

McLaughlin Spars with Zucker, Other DOH Officials, Over PFOA Contamination (Video)

 

Temperatures rose in the first hours of Wednesday’s joint legislative hearing into water quality during a heated exchange between state Assemblyman Steve McLaughlin and state Health Commissioner Howard Zucker. The Republican lawmaker, who represents part of the Rensselaer County area affected by PFOA contamination, has been waiting for months to pose questions to Zucker in a hearing.

McLaughlin began by upbraiding another DOH official for previously mentioning his stress and fatigue levels while dealing with Hoosick Falls; that was something the village’s residents might understand more keenly, the lawmaker said. McLaughlin’s first question to Zucker was whether he had felt a legal obligation to immediately inform the citizens of Hoosick Falls that their water was tainted.

“Assemblyman, I take issue to some of your statements,” Zucker said, insisting that he was keenly aware of the sense of anxiety in the community.

McLaughlin tried asking the question a different way: “Would you have let your mother drink that water for 18 months?” — a reference to the gap in time before Hoosick Falls’ resident Michael Hickey’s first test results and the state’s eventual December 2016 advice that residents shouldn’t drink from the village water supply or any other system with PFOA levels above 400 parts per trillion. 

Click here for video. 

Source: timesunion

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