Castle Homes, famous for being the home of the Castle Homes Crapper, who pooped on nineteen cars and became a viral sensation in the process, featured in over 50 international media outlets, is also home to an EPA Superfund toxic waste site called Summit Equipment & Supplies, a scrap yard which polluted the local neighborhoods and waterways.
The short film about Superfund site received no media attention, other than a short news piece, where WEWS asked the community one set of questions, about the PCB’s in Nesmith Lake, and delivered a news piece about illegal dumping, which none of us had been interviewed about except Mary Martin. Even though she was featured first in the interview, she was actually interviewed last and asked a different set of questions.
During the release of the film three separate petitions were run to numerous State and Local Ohio officials, and the Akron Beacon Journal. 1000+ signatures were gathered. 850 current and former residents gathered on a Facebook Fan Page to demand answers to the seemingly high level of cancer and other illnesses in quiet residential neighborhood..
In the end, The Akron Beacon Journal issued no response. Recently resigned Akron Mayor Don Plusquellic also failed to issue a statement. His replacement, Garry Moneypenny who was head of Akron City Counsel at the time was ousted as mayor after only ten days in office. He resigned after he sexually assaulted a city employee, to “celebrate becoming mayor.”
Ten months after the film was released Berdyck was investigated in, 2014, by the EPA for the scene in Poison in the Grapes where he went into the Region 5 EPA office.
He was cleared of all wrongdoing.
Nesmith Lake is currently has an eating ban on the fish and sediments are contaminated with PCB’s.
If you’d like to know more about Superfund sites or the incident in Castle Homes please go to www.matthewberdyck.com and read the Death Water Writing Piece
Poison In The Grapes 
This is an atrocious environmental tragedy. The actions of the mayor and the newspaper, refusing to respond to the petitions, show evidence of complicity. The Beacon Journal, from 1986 to 1991, printed misinformation which was issued by EPA employee Ralph Dolhopf. Later, all of his statements turns out to be false.
In fact, the city let the site fester, and allowed children to play, and for local residents to use the site as a short cut, until 1991 when they found the unexploded tank and mortar shells which required the Department of Defense to get involved.
Oddly, it was Plusquellic who did the most work to get the site cleaned up, but now, thirty years later, he refuses to comment, or address the deficiencies in the effort to provide accurate information to the residents. There was no public interest because the EPA and newspaper told everyone there was “nothing to worry about.”
However, Don Plusquellic said, in 1989, “I think everyone should know about this.” And to honor his wishes we are going to make sure that happens. He might have slid out of office like the snake he is, to avoid liability, but it’s us that control his reputation in the history books.
Don Plusquellic: The Toxic Don
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Is the top picture of downtown Akron? Have the people that live in the area been notified by the EPA? Is that something thats mentioned in paperwork somewhere when buying a house in the area? How many other people have been effected by the waste in that area?
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Haha no, that is the photo that came with the blog. I think it is New York City.
In 1991 they sent out 300 mailers, “some to residents.” 70 people attended the public meeting. When I did the film release in 2013, almost all of the 850 people who joined the fan page has not heard about it before.
There have been Beacon Journal articles about the clean up effort, but the Beacon has a very limited audience.
When you buy a house in the area they are not required to disclose if is near a Superfund site. Even though there is a plume of TCE, under the site, they have not done testing in the neighborhood for vapor intrusion, or the chemicals entering an enclosed space and then welling up.
TCE was banned in the 1970’s for causing cancer.
Over the years the site has probably effected around 10,000 people, based on the demographics for Castle Homes.
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I enjoyed the film. As a documentary film maker, Matt, goes to the point and lays out facts that are pretty hard to ignore. His passion is obvious and is grand motivation for others.
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qualtech2007@gmail.com
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Dave was one of the people who played in the dump with me, and was with me the day I found the bomb. You can tell from his comment, that he too, has been exposed to toxic waste.
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