Speak up about dioxin settlement: Public has 30-day window regarding deal
among Dow, state and feds
By Barrie Barber | The Saginaw News
October 16, 2009, 4:49PM
After years of debate on the risks of dioxin contamination in the Saginaw and
Tittabawasee rivers, it boils down to this: The public has 30 days to comment on
a major clean-up plan for the two waterways.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state Department of Environmental
Quality will begin a 30-day comment period Monday on a proposal drafted behind
closed doors with the Dow Chemical Co. of Midland.
The proposed settlement — already agreed to verbally by the EPA, DEQ and Dow —
outlines a process for evaluating and cleaning up historic dioxin contamination
in the Tittabawassee River and Saginaw River and bay.
“It’s a significant achievement compared to where we’ve been the last six years”
during negotiations, said Robert Van Deventer, president of the Saginaw County
Chamber of Commerce.
“This whole region wants this issue to be dealt with and identify what needs to
be done in the cleanup and where do we go from here. There’s some momentum
moving forward which we haven’t seen in a long time.”
Comments are welcome through Nov. 17 and can be submitted online, EPA officials
said. The EPA also has scheduled a public meeting for 7 p.m. Nov. 5 at Saginaw
Valley State University’s Curtiss Hall.
Dow has signed the settlement but is waiting for the DEQ and EPA to finalize the
agreement after public comment, said Mary F. Draves, a Dow spokeswoman.
“We are focused on moving forward with this agreement once the public comment
period is over,” she said.
The company is footing the bill for the cleanup. Dioxin is an industrial
pollutant linked to reproductive problems and some forms of cancer in lab
animals.
EPA officials say their agency and the DEQ will not sign the agreement until
public comment has been fully considered.
“In all settlements, there’s a little give and take,” said Wendy Carney,
Superfund program manager for EPA Region 5 in Chicago. “I think, overall, it’s a
solid settlement and it will lead us to cleanup, and that’s what we were
shooting for in this process.
“We need to hear from the public. We are interested in their perspective,
interested in what they have to say about it.”
Mick Hans, an EPA spokesman, said the proposed agreement, called an
administrative order on consent, could be revised based on feedback.
The EPA has been negotiating with Dow in private since June, with starts and
stops along the way, under an alternative approach to the Superfund process, a
federal program for dealing with highly contaminated sites. The alternative
approach is more guidance-based than regulatory.
Highlights of the proposal include work the company must complete to identify
cleanup options along the waterways. A fact sheet shows cleanup work on the
Tittabawassee River running from 2011-2014, and work to address the Saginaw
River and Bay beginning in 2012.
The agreement would allow the EPA to assess fines against Dow if the company
doesn’t follow the terms, Carney said.
The proposed settlement and the fact sheet are available for review at the Grace
A. Dow Memorial Library in Midland and the Hoyt Library in Saginaw. The proposal
also is online at epa.gov/region5/sites/dowchemical, where comments can be
submitted electronically.
Residents with questions about the comment process can call EPA community
involvement coordinator Patti Krause at (800) 621-8431.
Comments also may be e-mailed to Krause at krause.patricia@epa.gov or sent by
U.S. mail to Patricia Krause, Superfund Division (SI-7J), U.S. EPA Region 5, 77
W. Jackson, Chicago, IL 60604.
Jeff Kart of The Bay City Times contributed to this report.
http://www.mlive.com/news/saginaw/index.ssf/2009/10/post_5.html
Reader Comments
Posted by beansforlife
October 16, 2009, 7:03PM
Nice to see the Saginaw News got comments from Dow and its subsidiary, the
Chamber of Commerce.
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schinella
Posted by Misweety55
October 17, 2009, 1:09AM
What; no comments from Midland's Board of Realtors? Are we truly supposed to
believe 30 days of comment is going to change a darn thing after 30+ years of
obfuscation, denial, cover-ups, phony science and food dragging? Oh, Brother!
Dow and EPA say Dioxin is an industrial pollutant linked to reproductive
problems and some forms of cancer in lab animals? Sure. Like people can't check
multiple websites and other sources of information and will just take their word
at face vaue? Do they think everyone who isn't a scientist is an illiterate
idiot? Just type "dioxin toxicity" or "dioxin contamination" into any search
engine and read the results and weep as you begin to connect the dots with
auto-immune diseases and cancers in friends, relatives and recent ancestors who
lived in just the contaminated areas EPA and Dow acknowledge. I still affirm
that dioxin contamination; i.e. dumping, cannot be considered historic if the
toxin remains as a contaminant of soil and water.
For additional articles like this one, go to the Tittabawassee River Watch web site www.trwnews.net for complete coverage of the Tittabawassee River Dow Chemical dioxin contamination saga. . The Newspaper / Media page of our site contains an extensive archive of media articles dating back to January 2002. The source organization's web site link is listed to the right of the article, visit often for other news in our area. The Newspaper / Media page may be accessed by scrolling down to the bottom of the CONTENTS section and clicking on the Newspaper/Media link.