Sterigenics: Dist. 86 Should Finish Its Notification Obligation

In my last essay, I chastised the Hinsdale Township High School District 86 (Hinsdale 86) for refusing to notify its past employees about the health risks associated with working in Hinsdale South High School which was polluted with a known carcinogen, ethylene oxide (EtO), released by the Sterigenics Willowbrook plants for the past 35 years. I’ve also explained my personal stake in this issue and what has led me to working to increase notification of possible Sterigenics victims.

To follow up and give credit where it is due, Hinsdale 86 has now sent out notifications to some of its past employees. As one of the district’s traditions, teachers who have worked in Hinsdale 86 for twenty-five years are initiated into an honorary society, the Quarter Century Club, while support-staff members (custodians, secretaries, aides, for example) with fifteen years’ experience are inducted into the Crystal Club. (Long-time readers of this blog may remember some controversy which surrounded these Clubs in 2016.) And since the district already had a list of contact information for these individuals used to mail out invitations to each year’s induction ceremony, it sent a letter to these past employees which indicated the Village of Willowbrook’s having concerns about Sterigenics and the release of ethylene oxide, directing recipients to the Sterigenics page on the Hinsdale 86 web page. So, kudos to Hinsdale 86 for letting some 231 past employees know that something was up with Sterigenics. Although I have many reservations about the efficacy of this notification in both its coverage and the information provided, Hinsdale 86 at least has begun to do the right thing by its past employees.

It would be dishonest for me to imply that this measure is enough, though. The group of teachers and support-staff members notified is only a fraction of those who were impacted by EtO from 1984 (when Sterigenics began polluting the Willowbrook area) until 2019 when the plants were finally closed. It’s not clear how many past Hinsdale 86 employees did not receive this notice, but a conservative estimate would place that number in the hundreds. And even if it were less than that, when the issue is someone’s health, failure to notify even one person is one too many missed. To illustrate the sorts of people this coverage will not notify, I know of one past employee who worked at South for 23 years, has breast cancer which is related to EtO exposure; and got no notification from the district.

When the board decided to reject my previous request to notify all past employees, those opposed cited two reasons for their reluctance: 1. Notification could put the district at legal risk; and 2. It would be too much work for too little return. (You can hear the discussion for yourself at 1:35:15 of this video as well as my request at 0:07:00, in an earlier video.) But the recent notification of Quarter Century and Crystal Club members puts one of those rationales to rest: The district seems to understand it faces little to no risk of lawsuits being generated by its admission that South’s air was polluted. I and some who are part of Stop Sterigenics (a group of local, heroic activists which has been instrumental in getting EtO out of Willowbrook, and are now generating a national following) have looked into this, and it would appear that only the organization behind the pollution could be subject to legal liability in notifying past employees. There are some regulations regarding what an employer who produced the pollution—in this case Sterigenics releasing EtO—has to do to let its ex-employees know about health risks, but organizations which had nothing to do with the poison except to be located near the original source are not subject to any of these regulations or responsibilities. Long-term environmental health risks on job sites adjacent to polluters nearby is a relatively recent phenomenon, and the laws governing them haven’t yet caught up to what has been happening, especially in the Willowbrook area.

The good news is that Hinsdale 86’s objections based on being sued by ex-employees seems unfounded based on the best information available. And if you watch the video of board members discussing this, you will hear that no one offers any documented evidence of this concern, but just speculate based on personal experiences with the law. Hinsdale 86 faces little legal risk for notifying past employees. Even if it did, sending out a notification letter to over 200 past employees suggests the district is accepting that risk, again making the overall argument moot. It makes little sense, then, not to finish the job and notify all past employees who were exposed to EtO.

Which leaves “It’s too much work for what we might get out of it” as the sole argument preventing the school board from instructing its Human Resources department to try to contact the other impacted employees from 1984-2019. I can’t pretend to have the slightest objectivity when it comes to placing a value on the time and effort it would take to locate people whose health might be improved by finding out about a health risk which could negatively impact them. I also won’t agree or accept that even if HR has to use many hours of the department’s time to impact somebody’s life—even if it’s only one—that expenditure would be a waste. Keep in mind that the people who have been affected are in that situation only because they worked for the organization expending its resources to locate them. I do not believe the taxpayers of Hinsdale 86 would ever consider such time used for those who devoted their careers to educating the community’s children as a “waste.” And the board should also understand that this callous reasoning certainly will not stop those of us from continuing to battle for more and better notifications for past employees.

Nobody I’ve talked to about this issue has ever suggested that Hinsdale 86 is responsible for the sword of Damocles which hangs over past employee’s heads; but some of us are definitely starting to wonder at the hesitation being shown to do what is obviously the right thing, the human thing, the kind thing, the reasonable thing, the moral thing, and—without question—the only thing to do. Hinsdale 86 should notify all its past employees as soon as possible.