@Anonymous: It’s not clear why it has taken so long to clean up. For one, thing the government was unsure of how much was dumped and where it had been disposed of (it thought it went to another landfill) until after a Post-Dispatch reporter uncovered it in 1976 (it was dumped in 1973).So it took until the early ‘80s for early site investigations to determine what was there. Federal cleanup programs like the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) were just getting off the ground. Initially, FUSRAP was run by the Department of Energy, which is potentially liable for West Lake. And the DOE did not want West Lake in the program, reportedly because it had been contaminated by a private company.The EPA has had jurisdiction since 1990. EPA superfund cleanups typically take years and years and years. They’re expedited when there’s an imminent threat to the community or environmental contamination, which the agency has consistently maintained is not occurring here (other than some groundwater contamination that EPA says people aren’t exposed to).EPA did propose capping the site in 2008, but residents said they were concerned groundwater would still be an issue, so EPA took a step back and is evaluating more intense cleanups, including removal or encapsulation. But yes, seven years since 2008 is a long time. EPA is starting to show more urgency, committing to a proposal by the end of next year and changing some of its local leadership over the site.They’ve faced lots of criticism for the pace. Here’s a look we took at that at the beginning of the year: