Disruptions shake EPA's Superfund Records Center

SAN FRANCISCO - A number of strange internal disruptions have been crippling the Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund Records Center based in San Francisco. This office processes important documents needed to bring big polluters to justice.

Today their phone system was shutdown because of unpaid phone bills since January or February.

This latest disruption is one more in a line of what are beginning to look like a pattern. Previously, a number of critical office machines have been disabled and remained so for long periods of time. These include copy machines, their phone switch, and important parts of their computer network.

The Records Centers is run by The Arctic Slope Regional Corporation under a contract from the EPA. They won this contract about the same time the Bush administration came in.

This office has also been threatened with 50% staffing cuts, which to date have been put off, but are expected in the fall of 2004.

These disruptions make it nearly impossible for the EPA to bring justice to big polluters.