Summary of Case

LOVE CANAL

In 1894, a man named William Love tried to build a canal to unify waterways into shipping systems in New York, but did not finish because he did not have enough money to fund the project. The space was named the Love Canal. The Hooker Electrochemical Corporation used the site as a waste dump in 1942. Hooker bought the canal and the surrounding land in 1947. By 1950 more than 21,000 tons of chemicals were in the canal. Hooker installed an impermeable cap to prevent water from entering the canal, and the former canal disappeared underground.

The local School Board needed to build a new school in the early 1950s. They bought the Love Canal property. The Hooker Company says that they told the board about the toxins, but sold the land to them anyway. An elementary school was built on the property and the school board sold the rest of the land to developers who built a bunch of houses on the rest of the property. The construction of these buildings caused the canal’s cap to break.

The first known case of exposure to the buried toxins occurred in 1958. People were informed, but no one took any action. In 1978, the New York State Department of Health (NYSDH) became involved in the matter after it was featured in the media. Tests were done on the area, revealing chemicals that were causing health issues among residents in the Love Canal. A public health emergency was declared on August 2nd 1978.

The state then purchased homes nearest to the canal, and the houses were worked on. The residents of the Love Canal area were not satisfied with the studies done by the state, so they sought scientific aid outside of the government’s environmental health establishment. Unusual health issues among residents living in homes along the path of the flow of the toxins seeping out of the canal were then discovered. This information was announced three months later and no one really did anything to solve this problem.

The homeowners in the Love Canal area were angry because they were not receiving any help to fix the chemical problems. On May 19th, 1980 homeowners locked 2 EPA representatives in an office for 5 hours until FBI agents came and demanded their release. They did this to receive media coverage to have their problem recognized by higher authorities. The problem was recognized by President Carter, and they received the money to relocate the rest of the residents in the Love Canal area. Another company bought Hooker Chemical in 1968 and was filed with lawsuits to cover the costs of the cleanup and relocation programs. Love Canal was renamed Sunrise City and the cleanup was complete in 1994.

Ethical Concerns: Action to Protect Public Health

Another values issue is the extent of evidence needed to justify action to protect public health. Should public health officials demand, as they often do, that the data indicates a 95% probability that the problem is related to the environmental concern? For example, if evidence shows that there is an 80% chance that exposure to some chemical in the environment may cause a serious adverse health effect, should the health officials refuse to inform the public of the risk or take action to prevent exposure until further studies -- which may take months, or even years -- raises the certainty of the causal relationship to 95%?

If there is a public health concern, regardless of the percentage, the public should be informed and precautions should be taken against this hazard because they have a risk of contracting some form of health disorder. 80% is still a very high percentage and many people would unknowingly be exposing themselves to harmful chemical toxins or radiation. When public health is a concern, there shouldn’t be a question as to whether precautions to protect the public should be taken, it should be a given.

Ethical Concerns: Public Officials Withholding Info on (Environmental) Hazards to People- Ethics are Questionable

Is it reasonable to expect that the ethical duty of public officials is to respond to an environmental problem by objectively examining the scientific facts and the potential hazards to local residents, independent of economic and political considerations?
The people do have good reasons to expect unbiased information coming to them about hazards that have to deal with them. Our group agrees that the public deserves to know; we think that they deserve to know everything (especially potentially harmful situations) that deals with them (and their families). Even if the information could cause them political or financial trouble, the situation could be even more risky (physically- for example: toxins living beneath their houses). The public officials should let the people know and tell them everything (objective view point) no matter how it affects their political standing or financials needs/problems.

Ethical Concerns: Recieving money for exposure to toxins

In recent years the issues of environmental justice and equity have been raised within the environmental movement. Minority populations, and poor people in general, have produced persuasive data showing that they are far more likely to be exposed to environmental pollution from factories or waste disposal facilities than more affluent white people.One proposal that has been put forth in response to demand for environmental justice is to provide some form of reward to those who live in neighborhoods where exposure to environmental toxins is significantly higher than average. Would this be an ethical practice? What other steps might be taken to promote environmental equity in an ethical manner?


We do not think receiving an award for being more exposed to toxins than average would be an ethical practice. You should not be paid money for where you choose to live. Other steps that could be taken to provide environmental equity is to be informed on the amount of environmental toxins in your area before you choose to live there.

Ethical Concers: Witholding information from the public

One of the charges raised against the NYSDH and the Health Commissioner was that the public health establishment would not divulge the details of the studies that led to its decisions, held many closed meetings and even refused to reveal the names of members who served on consultation panels it established. Do you think that there might be an ethical justification for such public agencies to refuse public access to such information? If so does this seem to apply to the Love Canal situation?

Public agencies should inform the public about studies concerning the public in any way. If the studies of the public agency do not concern the public or anyone else, they have a right not to give out information. The ethical decision would not be to withhold information that could prevent problems for others. The NYSDH and the Health Commissioner should not have kept their studies secret. I think that they did not want to admit that they made a mistake because they were embarrassed for not correctly doing their job. They could have prevented a lot of health problems for the people in the Love Canal area and saved a lot of money if they would have taken action with the information they discovered earlier in the situation.