Officials Say Former Site of Xerox Plant is Ready for Development
By Will Bigham, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, Calif.
May 8–POMONA — The site of a former Xerox Corp. plant that once was a source of contamination that area residents charged with polluting groundwater is now clean enough for development, according to Xerox and city officials.
Recent musings by Claremont officials about the possibility of building a police station at the 10-acre site, located at Towne and Bonita avenues, renewed fears among some about contamination.
More than 1,000 area residents filed a class-action lawsuit in the late 1990s against Xerox and two local water providers for allegedly polluting the groundwater, causing cancer, skin rashes and a host of other physical ills.
Xerox settled the suit in 2004. The terms of the settlement remain confidential.
The suits against the two water providers — the city of Pomona, and Southern California Water Co. (now Golden State Water Co.) — were thrown out in 2004 by a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge. The plaintiffs have appealed the dismissal.
Since the early 1980s, when leaked contaminants were initially discovered on the Xerox site, the company has conducted ongoing efforts to clean the area of toxins.
The long process is now nearly complete, Xerox and Pomona officials said.
A so-called “no further action” letter from the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board, the regulatory body responsible for overseeing the cleanup, is expected to arrive “within weeks, or within days,” said Raymond Fong, deputy executive director of the city’s Redevelopment Agency.
The letter will clear Xerox of additional large-scale site cleaning, but may specify minor work to finalize the process, Fong said.
Members of a work crew on the site last week said that final tests of possible pollutants were being conducted, and the site, even now, is clean enough for development.
“They could build anything here,” said Jeremy Squire, a senior engineer for Haley & Aldrich, the company conducting testing for Xerox. “They could build a day-care center here.”
Some who lived in the area where groundwater was believed to be contaminated are skeptical of claims that the land has been sufficiently cleaned.
Valerie Ogden, 58, who lived on Princeton Avenue in south Claremont nearly her entire life, joined the class-action lawsuit in 1999, claiming she suffered from symptoms known to be caused by pollutants leaked by Xerox.
In 2003, she developed cancer, which she also attributes to the Xerox contamination.
“We used that (water) to bathe, drink, swim. We ate vegetables that were watered by it,” she said. “I’m still suspicious of it. I still do not trust that it’s cleaned up enough.”
Ogden has since moved to Montclair — she said that most of her former neighbors have left as well — and most of the new residents of Princeton and Piedmont avenues, a u-shaped road that forms an isolated neighborhood, are unaware of the one-time contamination crisis in the area.
Those longtime residents who do remember said the perception of neighborhood tap water as polluted remains.
Residents “just live with it,” said Patrick Harvey, 21, who has lived in his family’s home on Piedmont for all but one year of his life. “We put our faith and trust in the system.”
Xerox operated its plant at the site from 1969 to 1990, and still owns the land. The city is considering several options for development, and discussed last year the possibility of attracting a mixed-use residential/commercial development.
Pomona Mayor Norma Torres recently dismissed Claremont officials’ idea to construct a police station on the site.
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