Craig Hammerman, District Manager, Community Board 6, just wrote to say:  “As a followup to the EPA’s meeting the other night where 2 candidates for the Community Advisory Group facilitator position were introduced to the community, they just released the following announcement.”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 2 is pleased to announce that Jeffrey Edelstein of Edelstein Associates has been selected by the Gowanus community to act as the neutral facilitator for the Gowanus Canal Community Advisory Group.  Mr. Edelstein is a professional environmental engineer with 20 years of expertise in storm water, wastewater and the Clean Water Act. He holds a BS. from Cornell University’s School of Biological and Environmental Engineering, and has trained in public policy dispute resolution at the Muskie School of Public Service, the University of Southern Maine Mediation Institute, the Consensus Building Institute, and the Lincoln Center for Land Policy.  In addition, Mr. Edelstein is on the national mediation/facilitation roster of the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution (USIECR), and is actively involved in initiatives that help grow and improve the practice of Environmental Conflict Resolution.

The Gowanus Canal is a recently listed Superfund site located in Brooklyn, New York.

Mr. Edelstein will now begin to work with the communities impacted by the site to help form the Gowanus Canal Community Advisory Group.