This evening my kids and their friends decided to paddle over to the island in one of my canoes. A nice leisurely paddle over there. There were no other boats on the river. It was close to sunset. A beautiful fiery orange sunset. A great time for an evening swim.

Did I say no boats on the river. Not quite. There were two Harris County Sheriffs Boats, a Game Warden boat, and a Coast Guard boat with a 50 caliber machine gun mounted on it.

The Sheriff decided to make the river safe from high speed canoes by, yes, pulling my teens over in their canoe. By the time they came over to them, blue lights a flashing, my kids were pretty much on shore of the island.

And of course the sheriffs were joined by the game warden boat. The other two boats passed by slowly watching my hoodlum kids. Guess they might need a third boat in case there was a high speed chase. They did the usual boat checks. Can’t have Paddling While Intoxicated can we? Had to check the ice chest. Looking for alcohol. One of the kids was 25. Dammit man. Can’t get them for that six pack of beer buried amongst the soft drinks.

Ah-Hah! Gottem. They were short a life jacket. I think that’s a $150 ticket. Maybe more. [ Editors note: Jason's last life jacket ticket was $500, not $150] At least that will pay for some gas for the four law enforcement boats running an otherwise empty river. Maybe a few 50 caliber bullets for that machine gun.

You know.. I’m all for the Sheriffs boats, and the Game Wardens, the Coast Guard being out here and keeping the peace. We need that. There have been a lot of boating accidents out here. People get to drinking and they fight or fuck with people, or beat their wives (or husbands), or wreck their ski boats. They drive their 55mph Waverunner like they’re indestructable and other boats don’t exist. Drunk folks do stupid shit. All of that stuff still happens, but it happens a lot less now. That is all thanks to them. A police presence is good for the river and the neighborhood.

But sometimes it’s a little bit overkill. Sometimes they go a just a little too far. They press the ‘by the book thing’ a little too much. Applying the letter of the law without proportion. Gone are the days me and my buds taking a 12 pack and going fishing in the john boat. Or kicking back on the beach across the river even. And when I’m out I’m more concerned about whether I have all my documents in order. Is the fire extinguisher on my wave runner still there. Do I have enough life jackets to cover everybody that will ride with me in my john boat. Is my boat going to be searched, possibly towed back to the dock by the police for some silly ass infraction I didn’t even know was a law. They’ve taken a lot of the fun out of putting a boat in the river. And as my kids learned, even if you are paddling a canoe.

And, yeah, when you have four Game Warden/Sheriff/Coast Guard boats patrolling the river and there are no other boats but you and your fellow officers, you have to find something to do to occupy and otherwise justify your time out there running the river. But you think they would have bigger fish to fry. What with the crowds at Banana Bend and Loves out of hand. Or patrolling around the dam. Something better to do than write tickets to kids missing one out of four life jackets paddling 50 yards across the river. Two boats spending a half an hour grilling some teens in a canoe seems, well, silly.

Thanks to them for patrolling our river. We need it. And we appreciate it. But come on guys.. a canoe??

Fishing Near Toxic Waste Pits will Poison You

By Gilbert Hoffman

Star Courier

July 22,2010

HIGHLANDS– Two organizations are holding public meetings this week, to present information on the dangers to human health present in the toxic waste pits that are partially buried on land in the San Jacinto River near Interstate 10.

Texans Together, describing itself as a community service organization helping citizens organize for better environments, education and life issues, held a meeting last Saturday at the Highlands Methodist Church, attended by about 50 interested citizens.

At that event they presented information about the dangers and the history of the Toxic Waste Pits that are now polluting the San Jacinto River. They also invited Harris County First Assistant District Attorney Terry O’Rourke to speak about the legal efforts to get the EPA and the private polluting parties to mitigate and eliminate the dangers.

Later this week, on Thursday evening, the federal EPA and the state TCEQ, the two environmental agencies dealing with the Superfund site problem, will hold a public hearing at the Highlands Community Center, entitled “Superfund Site Community Engagement Meeting” for the purpose of meaningful participation by the community in helping EPA provide responsive decisions that address stakeholder concerns.

The public is invited to this meeting too, which is scheduled to last from 6:30 to 8:30pm at the community center. According to the press release, community members will have the unity to ask agency officials site-related questions, and also provide comments and suggestions. Items to be discussed, according to EPA, include ongoing Remedial investigations/Feasability Study,the start of the site stabilization and removal, public awareness, and future activities.

In the Texans Together meeting, a very professional slide show gave an overview of the work that this organizationhad been doing in the community to gauge interest and involvment with the Waste Pits and the river , and a primer on the Superfund process, how long it takes, and what methods might be used to remediate the problem.

Speaking to the group was Esteban Tovar and Maureen Haver of Texans Together. Haver is a native of the area, having grown up in the Baytown and Highlands areas. They talked about the Dioxin in the river, that were buried by a waste management company, McGinnes Industrial Maintenance. At the time, this method was legal. The dioxins were left over from the paper making process of Champion paper mills.

Mcginnes was later bought by Waste Management Corporation, and Champion Paper Company was bought by International Paper Company. These two companies are working with the EPA, to determine a satisfactory method of permanently disposing of the toxins in the soil and water around the disposal site.

Although the dump sites were only used into the 1970s, it was not until the 1990′s that the dangers of dioxins in the river became known. Advisories and signs were posted at that time, to warn persons in the area that the poisons were especially prevalent in catfish, speckled trout and blue crabs. No more than one meal a month was advised for consumption.

Dioxins have been shown to cause nerve damage, birth defects, cancers, and death in laboratory experiments on animals.

Diana Pena of Texans Together led a team that surveyed residents of Baytown, Highlands, and Rio Villa in Channelview. Over 1424 homes were approached, and interviews conducted with 381 persons. Surprisingly, 72% had not heard about the waste pits , even though 20%had consumed fish from the river. The danger of not knowing was obvious, she said.

Attorney O’Rourk said that his office, representing Harris County , had signed an agreement leading to containment of the hazardous materials leaking from the Waste Pits. However, this a short term solution, and the purpose of these meetings is to get citizen input on preferences for long term elimination of the dangers of the Superfund Site, they said.

Two Public Meetings This Week on Toxic Waste Pits

by Bobby Horn Jr.

HIGHLANDS – Residents concerned over potentially fatal chemicals in the San Jacinto River will have the opportunity to air their concerns at two public meetings to be held over the next week.

The group Texans Together will  host a Town Hall meeting July 17 at the Highlands United Methodist Church, 107W. Houston, at 2pm.

And the federal EPA and state TECQ will hold a “Community Engagement Meeting” on Thursday, July 22 at the Highlands Community Center from 6:30 to 8:30 on the same subject, removing the poisons from the San Jacinto River Superfund Site near the I-10 bridge.

Estiban Tovar of Texans Together spoke last week to the Highlands Rotary Club explaining that his group is a community service organization dedicated “to build a strong grassroots movement that educates and mobilizes average Texans to fight for their economic opportunity.” Their interests include education, health care, and the environment. Topics to be discussed during the Texans Together meeting include ways residents can get involved in the cleanup process and how to protect themselves from potential health risks.

Located along the western bank of the San Jacinto River just north of I-10, dangerouse waste from a paper mill, contaminated with a hastardous substance known as dioxin, lies partially submerged in waters from the 1960s when it was dumped there by a waste removal firm.

Samples collected from sediment, water ,fish and crab tissues both upstream and downstream from the site show elevated levels of dioxins above health based benchmarks. The ingestion of dioxin is known to cause cancer, skin conditions, delay physical and neurological development and is know to have long-term effects on the immune and reproductive systems. Several years ago Harris County Precinct 2 posted warning sign s not to consume the fish or crabs from the river in this area. As a further deterrent, wire fencing has also been installed to make it difficult to reach the river.

Both federal and state agencies have warned against consuming seafood taken from the river. During the July 4th weekend volunteers monitored recreational use of the river, especially fishing near the I-10 bridge. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will hold a Community Engagement Meeting Thursday, July 22 at the Highlands Community Center, 604 Highlands Wood Drive from 6:30 to 8:30pm. This meeting is open to the public for information and comment.

This Meeting will focus on the Superfund Site, a federally-designated are that has been designated a “national priority” for cleanup.

EPA officials say the meeting is designed to “better enable community stakeholders to have more meaningful participation in helping EPA provide responsive decisions that address stakeholders concerns”

Residents will have the opportunity to ask questions and provide comments and suggestions on cleanup. There will also be discussion of the ongoing investigation and feasibility study and the start of site stabilization and removal.

On April 30 the Harris County Attorney’s office reached an agreement with International Paper and McGinnes Industrial Maintenance Corporation that will result in those companies designing and building a containment structure to stop the release of dioxin from the long closed paper mill waste site.

“Harris County has been pushing for a short-term solution to stop the ongoing release of dioxin into our waterways and we are very pleased that the EPA and the companies have responded with positive steps,”  said Harris County Attorney Vince Ryan

One of the things I’m kindof proud of is the Banana Bend Weather Station ( http://www.bananabend.net/~mtaylor/weather/index.html) . The project is coming along nicely and I’m having a lot of fun with it. I’ve been able to get the web server to read and record the data, and provide trending and archiving via a MySQL database.  In addition, I’m a member of Weather Underground, which has to be one of the best weather sites around if you are into following the weather.  After Ike, who isn’t?  The software uploads the data so Wunderground can display it.

My weather gear is a LaCrosse WS-2315 I picked up on Ebay for $70 and it records indoor and outdoor temps and humidities, rainfall rates and amounts, barometric pressure and wind direction and speed.  It calculates a number of other parameters, like dew points and heat index from this data.  All in all, a great unit for a great price and I have had a lot of fun with it.

The WS-2315 comes with some basic Windoze software that will archive the data and produce a basic Jpeg image that displays current data and that works pretty well, but my web server runs Fedora Linux, so that wasn’t really a viable option for me. I chose a great weather monitoring package called WView ( http://www.wviewweather.com ). This software is simply awesome. It provide database archiving,  automatic webpage image production, charting, and even sending your data to Weather Underground (http://www.wunderground.com ).  What is amazing, is its free for peronal use under the GNU licencing agreement. It’s worth its weight in gold and generates a truly professional looking weather site.

I’m having a great time with it, and I hope yall are enjoying it too! Suggestions?

Welcome to my Banana Bend website.  This site is my attempt to learn a little about web page design and hopefully will be both interesting and informative. Take a look around!  I’m adding new things all the time and I think that if you enjoy the San Jacinto River, you’ll find something interesting here.  Hopefully I’ll be posting news and information about the river. A with a little luck, keep you informed of some of the local happenings.

Thanks for visiting, and feel free to participate. All the areas are open for your comments.