By Teracita Keyanna and Edith Hood / Red Water Pond Road Community Association
Uranium waste is a problem with no easy solutions. A proposal by the Environmental Protection Agency to remove uranium mine waste from our community, the Red Water Pond Road community 11 miles north of Church Rock, to the Red Rock landfill property 5 miles east of Thoreau, has generated some disagreements among members of the Navajo Nation.
We are writing to give our community’s perspective and to help base the conversation on accurate information.
Some of us had to move out of the community because our health has been impacted from living next to uranium mine waste for nearly 50 years. We believe, based on our lived experience and recent health studies, that chronic, long-term exposure to uranium mine waste from the Quivira/Kerr McGee Mine has led to respiratory problems, various cancers and other diseases and too many premature deaths.
We miss our home and want to go back. This is where our umbilical cords are buried. …