Courtesy of the East Chicago Public Library
The history of the lead debacle in East Chicago goes back to the early 19th century.
East Chicago sits on the boundary between Chicago and Northwest Indiana. There is an urban tale that is at least partly true that, after Chicago’s great fire, Chicago architect Daniel Burnham created a park along the Michigan Lake that “belonged to all of the people” and pushed all of the “dirty” industry across the state line into Indiana. East Chicago became home to lead and steel factories and oil and gas refineries, spewing toxic smoke into the air and leaching toxic chemicals into the Lake and the land surrounding the industrial plants.
A number of factories that spewed out such toxic chemicals as lead and arsenic were located in the area where the West Calumet Housing Development and the Carrie Gosch Elementary School would eventually be located.
The Factories
Grasselli Chemical Co,, which eventually was purchased by DuPont, was constructed in 1892. It was located just east of what would become the West Calumet Housing development. Anaconda Copper Smelting, which eventually became Anaconda Lead Production in 1910, and Eagle Pilching were located where the development now sits while the USS Lead facility, built in 1906, was situated contiguous to the development.
In 1920 Anaconda was purchased by U.S. Smelting and Lead Refinery, Inc., (USS lead). (Eagle Pilching was part of USS Lead.) USS Lead ceased operation in 1985.
Building the West Calumet Housing Development
The industries were built long before the West Calumet Housing Development in East Chicago and the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) came into existence. Construction of the Housing Development occurred between 1970 and 1973. Carrie Gosch Elementary School was built in 1959. 
It was demolished and a new school built immediately behind it in 1999. 
USS Lead and DuPont were still in operation when the West Calumet Housing Development and the first Carrie Gosch Elementary School were built. DuPont, now Chemours, continues to operate today.
Enter the Environmental Protection Agency
Both the development and the new school were built just as NEPA (National Environmental Protection Act) was established in 1970. The developers knew at that time that the property was not a good location for a housing development. However, NEPA did not start policing and enforcing requirements till several years later. Then, in 1980 instead of NEPA taking control of the site, control was ceded to the State of Indiana under Subtitle C of RCRA (Resource Conservation and Recovery Act). This Act “establishes a system for controlling hazardous waste from the time it is generated until its ultimate disposal — in effect, from ‘cradle to grave’.” However, this Act allows the State to work with industry to conduct a cleanup. In this case, the clean up was less than complete.
Finally, in 2009, the site was placed on the Superfund’s Priority List. Town meetings were held, plans were made but it was not until 2016 that EPA issued a major report to the city, citing the high levels of lead.
Where We Are Today
As a result of the report, then Mayor, Anthony Copeland, sent a letter to residents, requiring they evacuate the development. This was approximately a year after the Mayor had indicated he would like to re-develop the area which he felt was in need of repair with rotting structures and rusting pipes.
The houses have been evacuated and in April, 2018, demolition of the entire West Calumet Housing Development began. 
I have been writing about the problem in East Chicago for the past two years. It is closely related to the situation in Geneva, NY, as well as the problems of lead contamination in water found in Flint, Michigan, and in Newark, NJ.
It is interesting that the Arts community has taken note of the pervasiveness of lead in the environment. Productions of 19th century Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen are springing up around the country as well as in London. Two sequentially-running productions have been staged in Chicago in the first four months of this year. For more information on these productions, one of which is ongoing, please see my blogs.
There are many missing pieces to this history. I will be writing about them in future blogs as the information becomes available. If you have information about this area and the pollution problems endemic to it, I hope you will add your knowledge to it.