Vice News- by Sarah Sax
Swimming in Onondaga Lake is something most residents of the nearby city of Syracuse would like to avoid.
For over 100 years, the lake was used as a dumping ground for the county and industry groups like Allied Chemical, whose factories line the shore. It became known as the most polluted lake in America, and its reputation hasn’t faltered.
But over the past decade, the lake’s main polluters have spent more than $1 billion on water treatment plants and greywater infrastructure, as well as an ambitious engineering effort to dredge and cover 16 percent of the contaminated lake bottom.
They’re calling the cleanup a success, but not everyone is convinced.
“It’s still a Superfund site,” says Tadodaho Sid Hill, chief of the Onondaga Nation. “There are still toxins in there.”