Chicago Reader on Abrams Clinic's Work Concerning U.S. Steel's Toxic Spills
Lake surfers say polluted waves are making them sick—but they love it too much to stop
Last October, U.S. Steel violated its federal permit again when chromium was once more released into the water by Portage, the EPA said. While the company informed regulators at the Indiana Department of Environmental Management, it requested the incident be kept "confidential," the Chicago Tribune reported earlier this year. The U.S. EPA apparently wasn't aware of this spill until a Tribune reporter contacted the agency.
That's when Surfrider Chicago got involved. Under the federal Clean Water Act, private citizens can sue private companies for harming the environment. Surfrider, which is represented by the University of Chicago's Abrams Environmental Law Clinic, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Northern Indiana's Hammond office.
The suit says that surfers—unaware of what happened—were in the water shortly after the spill.
"The weekend following U.S. Steel's October 2017 illegal chromium discharge, surfing conditions on the Southend were among the best of the year," the lawsuit states. "Surfrider members were surfing on the Southend that weekend and surfers were at the Portage Lakefront without any awareness of U.S. Steel's illegal discharge."
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