The site, now owned by a developer, has been identified as a state superfund project for soil and groundwater contamination with the chemical pesticide chlordane and lead, according to a January 2012 DEC decision.
Chlordane, first introduced as a pesticide and herbicide in 1947, was banned for use in the U.S. by the federal Environmental Protection Agency in 1983, except for restricted underground termite control, which was allowed until 1988. The EPA identified the pesticide as a cancer-causing substance in laboratory mice. It is persistent in the environment and its presence in soils is still poisoning wildlife 30 years after it was banned.
Bianchi said in an interview this week he is not and never was responsible for the family business, which was owned by his parents and "liquidated almost 25 years ago." He was an employee at the greenhouse operation beginning in 1952, he said, and continuing until he was elected to the State Assembly in 1972, but he was never a shareholder in the company, I.W. Bianchi Inc.
"They started it before I was born and I didn't get any money out of it when it was sold," Bianchi said. Bianchi, a Democrat, served in the assembly for 22 years. With a partner, he started his own greenhouse business in East Patchogue in 1988 and moved it to Riverhead in 2005.
His parents' greenhouse operation was sold to Kirk Weiss greenhouses in 1990, Bianchi said. Weiss sold the property to Henron Development Corporation. Both Weiss and Henron were also named potentially responsible parties for the planned remediation.
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