If you’ve been starved for decades and someone puts a feast in front of you, you eat it, right? But what if it was just enough to feed you for a little while, and the price of eating it was that you’d never get another morsel after that? Or what if the food was rotten? Still a good deal or do you hold out a bit longer to make sure you get enough food for the rest of your life, and that of your children and grandchildren?

In many ways, that’s the decision facing New Bedford right now as the city and area residents evaluate the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Final Settlement with AVX Corporation for funds to clean up toxic PCBs in New Bedford Harbor. Many elected officials praised the deal when announced as a veritable feast of corporate funding in a time of tight government budgets. They ask us to eat today, ignoring both the quality of the meal offered and what happens when the funding feast runs out.