Water Woes Prompt Exodus From Erin Brockovich Town

Seems Erin Brockovich's heroics weren't enough to end her town's toxin troubles. More than a decade after the eponymous Julia Roberts film about the battle over toxic groundwater, Hinkley, Calif., is in the midst of a new wave of water concerns. The crisis has prompted more than a quarter of the population—some 200 people—to sell their homes to the very company at the center of the controversy, NPR reports. Pacific Gas & Electric offered to buy properties after residents began suffering rashes.

It's deja vu for a 36-year-old who was a teen when PG&E paid $333 million to residents after polluting the water with chromium. "I sat and I listened, and I was just like—these are the words they were telling us in '97," she says. She had hoped to stay in the town, thinking the danger had faded. But now, "I just want to leave." Others, however, are determined to stay. The company says a toxic plume is bigger than previously thought, but hasn't actually expanded. "The reason that it's larger is because we are testing in areas that haven't been previously tested," notes a PG&E rep, who adds that in addition to property purchases, the firm has offered residents home water-treatment systems. (More Erin Brockovich stories.)