General Electric’s Campaign Against

In addition to its media campaign, GE has many of the upstate New York local governments on its side. Their newspaper ads claim that fifty towns have passed anti-dredging resolutions, however, Pollack (2001) points out that this is more an indication of GE’s might then that of public opinion. Pollack contends that, “these votes reflect only the (not always unanimous) view of town boards in each of the communities, some of which have benefited from GE largesse.” Examples of this include $125,000 to Hudson Falls public schools for an upgrade in technology and $30,000 for renovation at a park on the Hudson in Schuylerville. He also states that many towns have established themselves as pro-dredging and are urging anti-dredging towns to reconsider their position.

General Electric filed suit in November of 200, arguing the CERCLA, specifically the unilateral administrative order, is a violation of due process that gives federal regulators unchecked authority to order intrusive cleanups without any judicial review. The EPA counters that reviews occur during the months of public hearings that are part of the CERCLA process. According to the EPA, before any cleanup can be fully enforced, it must get the approval of a U.S. District Court Judge who has the power to exonerate the company from any penalties and damages (Capiello, 2002 and Heilprin, 2002). According to Cappiello (2002), since CERCLA came into existence, six courts have thrown out the constitutional challenges to the law, including a more recent suit claiming the superfund law violates First Amendment Rights by not giving the public enough information to make and informed decision about cleanups.

Most recently, in July of 2002, GE reached an agreement with the EPA and signed an Administrative Order of Consent to begin sediment sampling in the Upper Hudson River. This is the initial step in designing the Hudson River PCBs site cleanup, consisting of 30,000 core samples and sonar mapping of the riverbed, in order to target and refine future dredging of the contaminated sediments (EPA, 2002). GE is currently on schedule to begin sampling the second stretch of the Hudson between Fort Edward and Schuylerville in the summer of 2003 (Hudson Voice, 2002).

GE has fought this proposal so hard because the dredging of the Hudson may only be the beginning. According to Pollack (2001), “it’s the precede

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