Tony Spaniola

Tony is a metro Detroit attorney and homeowner in Oscoda, MI. Tony became an activist on PFAS contamination, helping form the Need Our Water (NOW) Oscoda, after Oscoda’s water was found to be contaminated from the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base. He is a national expert on PFAS, a member of the National PFAS Contamination Coalition, and frequently called upon by government officials, reporters, and lawmakers for comment and testimony.

Tony became an activist on PFAS contamination, helping form the organization Need Our Water (NOW), Oscoda after Oscoda’s water was found to be contaminated from the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base, He is a leading expert and activist on PFAS and is frequently called upon by government officials, reporters, and lawmakers for comment and testimony.

“The ongoing PFAS contamination has placed an enormous burden on our community. Our local government has had to go into debt to fund municipal water line extensions that will take years to complete. Homeowners like me face the choice of paying expensive hookup fees or drinking bottled, or single-tap filtered, water. Signs warning of unsafe fish, wildlife, and the foam itself dot our forests and waterways, negatively impacting our tourism industry and, more importantly, the health of low-income individuals for whom nature is their primary source of food.”

“...DOD has broad and unchecked power to administer its PFAS cleanup program. And it has abused those powers – in Oscoda and across the nation. Information is tightly controlled by DOD, and too often kept from the public. Decisions impacting local communities are made in private and announced to the public for after-the-fact “input.” State regulators are threatened with loss of DOD grant funding – a tactic known as “weaponizing the grant” – should they attempt to challenge DOD actions. The DOD PFAS program is bureaucracy run amok.”