The Detroit River is not a policy issue. It is the reason we live here.

It is the water we fish from the pier at Bishop Park and from the fishing pier at the John D. Dingell Jr. Visitor Center in Trenton. It is the walleye run that brings out every boat in every marina from Ecorse to Gibraltar. It is where we kayak with our kids through Humbug Marsh on a Saturday morning. It is where we walk the riverwalk after dinner. It is the old couple on the bench who have been watching the same water for 30 years. It is the thousands of acres of the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge, the only international wildlife refuge in North America. It runs through our backyards.

It is ours.

And it has been poisoned.

For over 40 years, contaminated groundwater has been flowing from BASF's North Works facility into the Trenton Channel of the Detroit River. PFAS. Mercury. Benzene. Cyanide. Arsenic. Water so alkaline the EPA itself classifies it as hazardous waste. Up to 60 gallons every minute, by the state's own estimate. Day after day. Year after year. From a facility that sits 1,700 feet from where Wyandotte pulls its drinking water.

Nobody told us.

Not the city. Not the mayor. Not a single member of council. Nine months of public meetings in Wyandotte and the word PFAS was never spoken. The word BASF was never spoken. Not once.

They had time to change our billing cycle. They had time to add a late fee. The state flagged our water system for significant deficiencies that the state's own regulator said pose an immediate health risk to consumers of water. Those are not our words. Those are the state's words. April 30, 2025.

They just did not have time to tell us what was in the water.

In 2025, state regulators told BASF in writing that the company has been violating the 1986 federal consent decree that was supposed to stop this contamination. BASF wrote back and said they are in compliance. By the state's own estimate, BASF is intercepting less than 2 percent of the contaminated groundwater leaving its property. A geological engineer quoted in Planet Detroit looked at that number and called it window dressing. The full cleanup will not begin construction until 2027. The state's PFAS compliance deadline at BASF's primary outfall is September 30, 2028.

That is two and a half more years of poison flowing into a river our children touch with their bare hands.

One Wyandotte resident, a retired Army sergeant who spent ten years training to detect chemical threats you cannot see, came home and found one in his own tap water. He had his blood tested. Two independent laboratories, nine days apart, both detected PFHxS, an industrial compound specifically documented in BASF's groundwater at the facility up the street. He paid $350 out of his own pocket because no one else was going to.

Three of his dogs died between 2021 and 2024. Charlie. Dude. Jinju. They all suffered before they passed.

He and his wife are not leaving. His wife is from Wyandotte. Her mother lives in the home with them. Their rescue dog Bowie, who lost his leg before they adopted him, has a backyard here. This is their home. They are asking for it to be safe.

He is not alone. Read the comments on this petition. Neighbor after neighbor telling the same kind of story. Pets lost too soon. Children with unexplained illness. Families who have lived here for decades and never knew what was upstream. Every one of those comments is a witness.

This river is ours. Ecorse. River Rouge. Lincoln Park. Allen Park. Southgate. Riverview. Trenton. Grosse Ile. Woodhaven. Brownstown. Flat Rock. Gibraltar. Almost 300,000 of us share this river. We fish it. We paddle it. We cross its bridges every day. We raised our families on it.

Mercury from industrial sites on this river is one of the pollutants behind Michigan's fish consumption advisories for the Detroit River. Every family that puts a walleye or perch on the table is affected. Every parent who takes their kid to Elizabeth Park to learn to cast is affected. Every resident who walks the Downriver Linked Greenway along the water is affected.

We are paying for this cleanup with our own tax dollars. Federal Great Lakes Legacy Act funding has been dedicated to restoring the Upper Trenton Channel, the stretch of river immediately adjacent to BASF. Our money. Our river. BASF is threatening that investment with every gallon they fail to contain.

There is a live decision point, and it is close.

On May 19, 2026, the EPA is due to receive BASF's 100 percent Final Design for the Comprehensive Interim Groundwater Measure. That is the plan that will lock in how fast, how much, and how thoroughly the pollution stops. After May 19, the plan is set. Before May 19, the people who live on this river still have a chance to shape it.

We are not asking for more studies. We are not waiting for another deadline to pass. We are asking the three authorities who can still act.

EPA Region 5. Governor Whitmer. Attorney General Nessel.

Tell the people. Require the City of Wyandotte to formally notify every water customer about the contamination upstream of their intake and the federal health assessment already underway. Require every Downriver public water supplier drawing from the Detroit River to disclose what is flowing into their source water. They should have done this on their own. They chose silence.

Audit the system. Intercepting less than 2 percent of the contamination is not a cleanup. It is a gesture. Before the EPA locks the Final Design on May 19, order an independent audit of BASF's current interim measures and require expanded pump-and-treat capacity as a condition of design approval.

Speed it up. 2028 is not good enough. 2027 is not fast enough. This contamination has been flowing since before many of us were born. The EPA has the authority under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act to require faster timelines. Use it.

Open the doors. Hold a public forum in Wyandotte and at the John D. Dingell Jr. Visitor Center in Trenton before the EPA finalizes the cleanup design. Let the people who drink this water and fish this water see the plan before it is locked. We have earned that seat at the table.

Follow the money. BASF is one of Wyandotte's largest taxpayers and a major contributor to the city's Water Fund. The company has received substantial tax abatements from the city, including a 100 percent personal property tax exemption lasting 20 years. Attorney General Nessel, investigate why a city this financially entangled with a polluter has never once publicly discussed the contamination in a council meeting. And reopen the Ostaszewski whistleblower complaint your office declined in March 2025. EGLE has since formally found BASF in violation of the 1986 consent decree. That is new evidence.

This river raised us. It fed us. It gave us sunrises and Saturdays and the best fishing stories we will ever tell. It gave us the only international wildlife refuge on this continent. It deserves better than this.

And so do we.

Sign this petition. Tell your story in the comments. Share it with the neighbor on your left and the neighbor on your right. Every name here is someone who loves this river enough to fight for it. Every signature tells the EPA, the Governor, and the Attorney General that Downriver is watching.

We have until May 19.

Sergeant Brian Burgess, U.S. Army, Ret. CBRN Specialist Wyandotte, Michigan NeoKhufu@gmail.com