The Brooklyn Paper: The controversial designation sets into motion a half-billion-dollar, decade-long federally overseen clean-up of the polluted waterway, which cuts a sclerotic artery through the gentrifying heart of Brownstone Brooklyn. But it also raises questions about whether developers, who currently yearn to build residential housing in the canal zone, will ever exhibit quite the same ardor now that the area has been deemed one of the most polluted places in the country.

“This site has a very long legacy of toxic pollution that plagues this urban waterway,” said Judith Enck, the EPA’s regional director. “And because of that, the EPA is saying it is adding the Gowanus Canal to the federal Superfund list. We believe it will get us the most efficient and comprehensive cleanup of this waterway.”

Enck started her statement by declaring that taxpayers should rest easy that the feds went with a Superfund designation, which sets into motion a process of getting restitution from responsible polluters.

“The goal of Superfund is to ensure that polluters pay for cleanup, not the taxpayer,” she said.

Photo, New York Times.

The New York Times Magazine features a piece today on the Gowanus Canal, and the environmental debate surrounding it as of late. How great is the photo? It’s the canal like I’ve never seen it.

“It’s this area of transition,” a real estate broker named William Duke told me recently. It was a warm weekday evening in September, and we were standing at the trash-strewn terminus of a street that dead-ends into the waterway. “Between the old and the new, the natural world and the man-made world,” Duke went on. “It’s poetic.”

Tomorrow, June 13, is the first-ever fundraiser held by PortSide NewYork, a young, innovative non-profit organization with diverse programs are about water and the waterfront. PortSide NewYork plans to create waterfront access, arts and recreational boating events, jobs, historical products and policy-programs for diverse economic groups and individuals. The fundraiser is taking place tomorrow evening from 6-9 pm at the Brooklyn Lyceum (227 Fourth Avenue @ President Street in Park Slope). Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, a major supporter of all things waterfront, will speak at the event, which will include food and wine. A large format multimedia installation of images and sounds from PortSide and the harbor will bring the waterfront inside. Proceeds from the fundraiser will support planning and interim programming in Atlantic Basin and shipping of the last two engine cylinders for the Whalen from Seattle. Tickets are $50 and may be purchased here. If you’re free tomorrow, go and show your support!

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed to add Brooklyn’s very own Gowanus Canal to its Superfund National Priority List (NPL).

EPA: “By proposing to list the Gowanus Canal, EPA can ensure that a thorough investigation into the source and extent of the contamination can take place,” said Acting Regional Administrator George Pavlou. “The sooner we get the listing underway, the sooner EPA can begin its work, so that one day the Gowanus Canal can be used again to benefit the people of Brooklyn.”

A 60-day comment period begins today for the EPA to receive public input regarding the addition of the Gowanus Canal to the Superfund NPL. For instructions on how to submit comments, visit here, or or contact Dennis Munhall, Region 2 NPL Coordinator at (212) 637-4343 or munhall.dennis@epa.gov.