Office

of the Senior Vice President

November 28, 2016

Dear Deborah,

The following is AJUs official statement with regard to the article you propose to file. We expect that
this statement will be included in its entirety in the article itself:

Whether or not DTSC officially informed AJU of its preliminary administrative draft EIR has no
relevance to the well-established safety of our property. As the Jewish Journal is aware, this
preliminary draft document is known to contain inaccurate, incomplete and outdated information.
Furthermore, DTSC was familiar with the contents of this preliminary draft document when DTSC
Director Barbara Lee recently declared, in a letter to Assemblyman Matt Dababneh that, Based on a
review of the U.S. EPAs data and findings, the Department concludes that there is no off-site
migration of contamination that would pose a threat to students, faculty, staff or visitors to the
Brandeis Bardin property. We are concerned and surprised that the Jewish Journal refuses to accept
the science-based verdict of DTSC, supported by reams of test results and careful analysis, and instead
insists upon perpetuating a harmful and false impression about the safety of our property. In doing so,
the Jewish Journal does a disservice to us and to our community.

We also wish to remind you of the statement that DTSC made to you regarding the very preliminary
nature of the document in question and reconfirming the safety of our property. We believe this
statement should be included in full in your article. That statement reads:

"The Project Description you were provided was a preliminary, administrative version of one section of a
draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR), which contained text that acted as a placeholder on several
issues and had not been fully reviewed by staff and management yet. This preliminary version of the EIR
section has been and continues to be revised as it undergoes staff and management review and the
placeholder text does not reflect DTSCs current analysis of the project. DTSC provided the preliminary
Project Description section to responsible parties to help initially clarify the scope of the project. DTSC
then provided this preliminary version to an individual who requested it through a public records act
request; it was not released as an official document for the purpose of public review or comment. When
the draft EIR is completed, DTSC will release it for public review and comment. Information on low levels
of chemicals in soils on the Brandeis Property (BBI) were provided at public meetings in 2014 and
2015. Evaluation of the data indicates that the impacted soils do not pose a threat to human health."
(emphasis added)


Finally, we urge you to consider the following:

The data in the administrative draft EIR is not newsworthy. The apparent reason that BBC is even
mentioned at all in the Project Description included in the preliminary administrative draft EIR is the
DOE sampling data showing near-background levels of substances that are commonly associated with
plastics, herbicides/pesticides, and forest fires. These substances are ubiquitous throughout the world
(and in this region in particular), so finding them at these low levels is hardly surprising. More
importantly:
a. these substances are not associated with SSFL activities;
b. they were detected in an area campers do not visit; and
c. they are far below even the strict levels that DTSC uses for residential screening.

In short, the samples show a soil profile that is not meaningfully different from what you would find if
you sampled the average American front lawn. Since DTSC has stated explicitly that there is no risk to
human health in these sample results or in any other data collected from BBC to date, it is difficult for
me to understand how an article about a project description included in a preliminary administrative
draft EIR would provide any meaningful information to your readership. On the contrary, it could well
serve to give further unfounded cause for concern.

Attached please find some additional responses to the questions you posed.

Sincerely,

Jay
Rabbi Jay Strear