9/11 Families Call On City To Remove Human Remains From Landfill for Burial
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Relatives of victims of the September 11, 2001, attacks called on the city yesterday to remove human remains from a landfill in Staten Island and build a dignified burial ground for those lost four years ago.
The renewed demands of “WTC Families for Proper Burial” came as the group prepared to take the issue to federal court. The group filed suit against the city in August, and the first hearing on the case is set for today.
“The city has decided that the Fresh Kills garbage dump is a suitable location to leave the people that they call heroes,” the co-founder of WTC Families for Proper Burial, Diane Horning, said yesterday at a ground zero rally. “In the rush to close and cap that landfill, they are also rushing to encase our loved ones in the garbage forever.”
In question are about half a million tons of ash that contain the remains of the more than 1,200 September 11 victims who could not be identified. The group of family members wants small bone fragments, tissue particles, and cremated remains moved out of Staten Island’s Fresh Kills landfill, where debris from the World Trade Center was taken, and into a permanent cemetery it wants built for the victims.
Ms. Horning suggested Governor’s Island, locations in New Jersey, or elsewhere on Staten Island as possible sites for a cemetery.
Mayor Bloomberg balked at the request, and a bill in the state Legislature stalled. After negotiations with the city made scant progress, the group filed suit.
A lawyer for the group, Norman Siegel, said the city had refused its request in a letter in 2004, citing the exorbitant cost a move would require and the lack of a place to relocate the remains. The city put the cost at more than $450 million, Mr. Siegel said.
Initially, city officials had told the families that the remains would be kept separate from debris, Ms. Horning said. She said they later learned that they were not kept separate, and the city had no plans to sift through the refuse.
The mayor’s office said it would not comment directly on the accusations or the prospective cost because the matter is in litigation.
“The city has worked diligently to balance the complex issues raised by the WTC families,” the head of the World Trade Center unit of the city’s Law Department, Kenneth Becker, said in a statement. “We remain committed to finding a solution that will appropriately honor those who lost their lives as well as those who partook in the recovery effort.”
Mr. Siegel said he would ask a federal judge to rule that the city had violated the due process rights of the families and force the city to work with them to move the remains.
“The goal would be to remove the remains to a proper and dignified burial site,” he said. “A garbage dump is not a proper burial site.”
Family members said they have 61,000 signatures on a petition calling for the removal of the remains, as well as the support of Senators Schumer and Clinton and the archdiocese of New York.