BROOKLYN residents say last week’s high winds made dust “indescribable” around the troubled industrial estate as they continue to live with dust levels equal to those experienced during Victoria’s Black Saturday bushfires.
Members of the Brooklyn Residents Action Group lashed out at the EPA for doing “nothing or very little” to alleviate dust, odour and other pollution. They fear they will again be advised to stay indoors with windows closed when the weather heats up.
The EPA’s website showed the air quality index reached 401 in Brooklyn last Wednesday. Air quality is classified as “very poor” when the index exceeds 150. In the first six months this year, 355 reports were made to the EPA about pollution in Brooklyn.
Brooklyn resident Carmen Largaiolli found her car, which had been parked under a covered pergola, covered in filth last Friday morning. “Not only was I met with a foul smell that was obviously the remnants of after-hours activities, but my car was absolutely covered in dust. I felt the grit under my feet while walking in the hallway of the house. I guess this is how far we’ve progressed.”
BRAG member Brian Long said living conditions had deteriorated.
“We still have the stench at any given time of the day and the dust has got worse,” he said.
“Our properties have devalued because of this, along with our health and patience.
“The EPA should be protecting the community from these companies that don’t comply with modern-day standards.”
Mr Long slammed the EPA over comments made to the Weekly last month that the EPA would not follow up residents’ reports to the pollution hotline unless they pinpointed the source of the pollution.
Mr Long said he had driven around to find the source of an odour, only to be told that a report could not be made via mobile phone from the source of the pollution.
“I would have thought that it is the EPA’s job to pinpoint odours and their source.”
EPA manager Richard Marks said the number of “dust exceedences” had halved in two years and one operator had moved out of the area.
“One operator [Australian Tallow] has been successfully prosecuted three times and required to install more than $1 million worth of improvement works. The works are due for completion this month.”
He said more than 30 pollution-abatement notices had been issued to operators and funding had been received to employ an independent dust consultant to help industry control dust.
