TALLEVAST — In this deeply rooted village in Southwest Florida, it’s not unusual to find generations of the same family living doors apart. Now these lifelong settlers are bracing for their hamlet to die.

The water in this black community tucked between Bradenton and Sarasota is poisoned with cancer-causing chemicals leaked from an old beryllium plant that anchors the neighborhood of 80 homes.

The health toll is still being gauged, but the residents have cause to fear the worst.

For more than three years, neither the plant’s owner nor Florida state regulators who had learned of the leak bothered to tell them. Read More