Urban Farm, Not Toxic Harm! City Taking Steps to Demolish the Historic Roof Depot Building

By THE EAST PHILLIPS NEIGHBORHOOD INSTITUTE

Negotiations with the city of Minneapolis have failed, and now the city is proceeding with its planned demolition of the historic Roof Depot building at 1860 East 28th Street after walking out of negotiations with East Phillips residents. Now our families, our community and our environment face 888 diesel trucks and toxic arsenic that will further pollute our already overburdened neighborhood. East Phillips is being treated as an industrial wasteland, and it’s making our community members sick! The City Council was scheduled to take a vote on demolishing the Roof Depot building in late September. We can stop this if the East Phillips Neighborhood Institute (EPNI) can raise $200,000 to post bond for a legal injunction.

The old Roof Depot site in the East Phillips neighborhood sits atop an arsenic plume where arsenic-based pesticides were produced and stored by a company that once occupied it. The building’s continued presence helps keep the arsenic in the ground. This arsenic previously caused the Environmental Protection Agency to designate the area a “Superfund Site,” prompting immediate soil removal from over 600 homes.

The city of Minneapolis bought the site to expand its public works yard, a project strongly opposed by East Phillips, one of the city’s poorest and most polluted neighborhoods, with one of the highest concentrations of BIPOC residents.… Read the rest “Urban Farm, Not Toxic Harm! City Taking Steps to Demolish the Historic Roof Depot Building”