Why are Kids Being Allowed to Go on Toxic Easter Egg Hunt in East Palestine?

“Having this event is dangerous and risking the lives of innocent children,” East Palestine resident Candice DeSanzo tells Status Coup

Still reeling nearly two months after Norfolk Southern’s 200+ car train derailed, and then exploded, in their small village, parents in East Palestine woke up on Tuesday of this week to news of an event being promoted in the coming weeks for their kids enjoyment.

An Easter egg hunt.

Of course, this may seem innocent at first glance. It’s something that happens in towns, large and small, across the country, year after year, in April. It’s an Easter egg hunt. But this year is different for residents of East Palestine.

Weeks after the February 3rd derailment and “controlled burn,” concerns about contamination in town are still prevalent, as many residents of all ages are still getting sick, still smelling and inhaling chemicals, and getting nowhere when they seek the appropriate help from government officials—and Norfolk Southern.

This event is currently set to take place on April 8 at the city park, a site very close to one we’ve reported about on Status Coup that includes a nearby heavily polluted stream, several aeration devices firing contaminated water up into the air, as well as an area that has flooded over not once, but twice in the weeks since the derailment. All of these contamination events have occurred right at the entrance of the park where kids will be hunting for Easter eggs.

 “Having this event is dangerous and risking the lives of innocent children,” Candice DeSanzo, an East Palestine resident with five children, told Status Coup. Several of her kids grew sick in the aftermath of the train derailment, including rashes, coughing, runny nose, nosebleeds, diarrhea, and burning skin.

“They wouldn’t even see him [her son] until I gave him a decontamination shower,” DeSanzo told Status Coup’s Louis DeAngelis in February.

On Facebook, she further condemned the event, calling it “absolutely disgusting!” and pointing out that the village doesn’t even have the full results back from soil testing.

Several residents, including Stella Gamble, have posted online criticizing the event and pointing out that the city park had just recently been used for storage of large holding tanks and dumpsters; tanks and dumpsters reportedly filled with filter socks and other items used in the contaminated waters of Leslie Run during the ongoing cleanup process.

The EPA waited weeks to conduct soil samples for chemicals that likely contaminated East Palestine as well as their byproducts like cancer-causing dioxins. Indiana, a state that accepted contaminated soil from East Palestine that was shipped off site from the derailment, decided to conduct its own tests.

As reported in The Guardian, those soil tests resulted in dioxin levels “hundreds of times greater than the exposure threshold above which Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists in 2010 found poses cancer risks.” 

To date, there have been no soil sample results made available to the public by the EPA from the City Park itself. However, just last week, yours truly was the only national reporter in the room at the East Palestine Council meeting—where the Town Manager had just announced a closure of the playground in the city park. “The park playgrounds are going to be closed until further notice for removing, cleaning, and putting down new mulch” according to Interim Manager Traci Spratt. The mayor, Trent Conaway, also chimed in, confirming that the tennis courts in the park would also be cleaned.

If the playground is being closed for cleaning, and the removal of mulch—as well as the cleaning of the tennis courts—it seems the City Council is rightly concerned about chemical contamination in the park harming residents’ health.

Why then is the East Palestine Park Board putting this event together in the first place?

According to a Facebook Post by the Park Board, “The Easter Egg Hunt this year will be in designated cleaned and sanitized areas including the community center, basketball and tennis courts.”  That may put some minds at ease, but based on the fact that the park has not had public soil testing data released by the EPA as of today, March 24th, 2023, and the cleaning and sanitizing history surrounding this event in East Palestine has not been the most transparent, some parents are still weary. 

The Easter egg hunt is still currently scheduled to go on. East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway, as well as the Parks and Recreation Committee chair Dr. Jessica Rocco, did not immediately respond to Status Coup’s request for comment.

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