PHCHCC - Interesting 10 days in Port Hope

So where do we go from here?
Health Canada has said Port Hope residents show normal levels of uranium in their system.
The Port Hope Community Health Concerns Committee (PHCHCC) — and by association, Families Against Radiation Exposure (FARE) — has had its Nov. 13 national media blitz backfire, outraging members of the Port Hope community to the point where the Citizens for Port Hope (CFPH) was formed and on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, 2,500 people signed a petition telling the groups to back off.

They undermined whatever limited support they once had.

The Uranium Medical Research Centre (UMRC), which the PHCHCC hired to do the controversial study, has cancelled its local public presentation of the study findings, citing harassment and threats to its author. This decision has left members of the PHCHCC out to dry, because Port Hope residents still haven’t seen the scientific evidence the UMRC claims to have.

FARE president and PHCHCC spokesperson John Miller resigned his post with FARE, although we can’t imagine he’ll be out of the headlines for long.

The ‘silent majority’ — residents who saw the PHCHCC and FARE as just minor irritations in the past — were given a voice by the CFPH, which vows to rebuild the image of Port Hope provincially and nationally.

Real estate deals, one reportedly worth over $1 million, have fallen through.

Downtown business owners (many of whom are responsible for the CFPH) feel their business will suffer, as tourists and potential new residents are frightened away by the media attention.

It certainly has been an interesting 10 days in the western reaches of Northumberland County.

But, despite all the uproar (of which this newspaper is also responsible), the only thing that has really changed is the perception of Port Hope on a national level. Recovery won’t be easy, because the national media was hardly as eager to splash the less sensational, but more important, news of Health Canada’s findings to the far reaches of the country.

The nuclear stigma will always be with Port Hope, and so continues the long road of wooing people to town, presenting the facts, showing them a wonderful time and hoping they tell their friends that Port Hope’s not so bad, after all.