Congressman Menefee Demands Answers from EPA on Fifth Ward and Kashmere Gardens Contamination

HOUSTON, TX — Congressman Christian Menefee (TX-18) today sent a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) demanding answers about the agency’s handling of the contamination investigation in Fifth Ward and Kashmere Gardens.

Local officials began pushing for state and federal investigations after state health officials confirmed a cancer cluster in the area. Following years of community advocacy and a legal effort that brought EPA to the table, the agency entered into a binding legal agreement in 2023 requiring a full investigation of the former Houston Wood Preserving Works site, a contaminated rail facility whose creosote pollution spread into the soil and groundwater of surrounding historically Black neighborhoods. 

“Community members in Fifth Ward, Kashmere Gardens, and nearby areas have been waiting for answers for years,” said Congressman Menefee. “They have watched family members get sick. They have sat through meeting after meeting. And they still have serious questions about how this process has been run. That is not acceptable.” 

Residents and community members on EPA’s own Community Advisory Group have raised ongoing concerns about how EPA conducted the investigation, including how testing locations and depths were determined, which contaminants were included in the protocol, whether the community had a genuine voice in key decisions, and why additional residential sampling recently took place with little explanation. The fact that EPA is not clearly communicating answers to these questions to residents who are closest to this issue is real concern.

In addition to these process concerns, the final report that EPA told community members would be released by late 2025 or early 2026 has still not come out.

“The community has been waiting for the report,” Congressman Menefee said. “And they have been raising concerns about this process for a long time, and they still don’t have confidence in how things have worked out so far. They deserve better than that.”

Those concerns are compounded by what the Trump administration has done to EPA since taking office. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin eliminated the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice and shut down environmental justice offices all throughout the country. The administration ended environmental justice as a consideration in EPA enforcement decisions, froze nearly $3 billion in grants intended for communities burdened by pollution, and proposed cutting the agency’s overall budget by more than 50%.

“This administration has made clear that communities like Fifth Ward and Kashmere Gardens are not a priority,” Congressman Menefee said. “They eliminated the offices that existed to fight for people in neighborhoods like this. They gutted enforcement. And now a community that has already waited years for answers is left wondering whether anyone at EPA is still in their corner. I am working to make sure the answer is yes.”

The Congressman requested that EPA brief his office on:

• The current status and expected release date of the Removal Site Evaluation report
• The methodology used for environmental sampling, including testing locations, depths, and contaminants analyzed
• The purpose of recent additional residential sampling
• EPA’s plan to communicate findings clearly and promptly to affected residents
• Any preliminary conclusions regarding potential health risks and future federal actions
   

The full text of Congressman Menefee’s letter to the EPA is available HERE.