Jessie Ball duPont Center (Haydon Burns) Renderings

[Charles Hunter]

... But when they did a enviromental study, they discovered that the building was built on top of an ash dump ... My cousin and mother both worked in the basement of the library for years where the perodicals were kept. Literally everyone who worked in the basement has either been diagnosed with cancer or some other medical issue. It was never addressed to my knowledge by the City of Jacksonville or Jacksonville Public Libraries. Can find any articles on the matter.

During my high school years, I worked at the Haydon Burns Library in the basement and the main floor! I'm in my mid-70s now, and no diagnosed cancer or other chronic health issues. Maybe I need to get one of those full body scans?

[soepic]

Not sure of the men who worked there, but I know at least from 1990's to closure, most if not all the women had issues. At least 3 had breast cancer and 1 had a child with birth defects. My mom worked there and retired from a different library in 2017, but didn't get confirmed until this year. So I didn't think she was connected until she mentioned that she was had signs of possible cancer in 2000 when she was there after a few years, but doctor brushed it off. So it was slowly growing. Plus most of them worked only in the basement and desks were deep in there.

[thelakelander]

When was the site used as an ash dump? I guess it must have been before the old city hall building there? So back in the 19th century?

[Bativac]

Oh gosh, I spent a ton of time in that library basement in the mid to late 90s. Does the ash contamination have any connection to the Superfund sites downtown? I thought they were a little north of this area.

[soepic]

That is what I am trying to figure out. Not sure if it was an Ash dump site or one of the superfund sites. I just remember when when Peterbrooke was planning on redelevoping the building, they stopped due to the cost of environment clean up for the site. I am trying to find what was the issue and if it was corrected now that is an active building again. I remember either the news, Folio Weekly, or even Metro mentioned the issue but I can't find any reports now. I assume if it was big enough of an issue that Peterbrooke felt it was too expensive or involve to make the building safe enough to produce food there, there should be something about somewhere or someone that may know. The most I could find was that the cleanup was done, but no details of what. Just weird that several people that worked at the same time in the same place became sick and reports of cleanup was needed and no reports of it nowhere. Plus the track record of the City doing underhanded things at the time, like denying employees pension benefits via illegal practices, makes things seem sus.

[Charles Hunter]

An inkling of a shred of a memory is percolating up to my semi-consciousness ...

Something about a fuel tank that leaked into the surrounding soil. I don't remember if it was from the old city hall or from the Haydon Burns Library.