On the community bulletin board at the Hinkley Market, people looking for lost dogs and have tacked up loose pieces of paper with staples and nails. Pacific Gas & Electric also uses the space to update the people of Hinkley and their efforts to clean up chromium 6 contamination in the groundwater.

The clean-up program took a major step forward as demolition crews began clearing properties bought by PG&E. According to spokesman Jon Tremayne, PG&E brought 12 properties in Hinkley over the past six to nine months.

Tremayne said PG&E bought the properties, which sit outside of the contamination plume, to give the company more room and flexibility to install monitoring wells and perform the clean-up treatment.