Ever since St. Louis County resident Marcella Mays heard that the ground beneath her home is contaminated with a hazardous and potentially cancer-causing chemical, she hasn’t been able to get it off her mind.
For 10 years, she has lived in her 1,400 sq ft, two-story townhome near Interstate-170 and Page Boulevard. And it’s been 22 years since a metal company across the street spilled a grease-cleaning solvent, Trichloroethylene (TCE), into the ground. Now beneath some homes, the TCE levels are considered dangerous.
“My kid is out here playing all the time, and this is the first time I’ve heard about it,” she said. “It’s scary because I don’t really have health insurance. I think about it everyday. Am I inhaling something I shouldn’t be inhaling? Do I need to move?”
Mays’ townhome is in a public housing development called Elmwood Park, which is co-owned by the Housing Authority of St. Louis County.
On July 26, Housing Authority Executive Director Susan Rollins said that they received a call from the Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR) about the high levels of TCE.
The Housing Authority called a public meeting in August – for their residents and others in the area – immediately after they received the call from DNR, Rollins said. And that was the first time the Housing Authority had heard anything about high levels of TCE in the area from the department, she said.
Pat Washington, spokeswoman for St. Louis County Health Department, said the county government also had no knowledge of the potential health risk.
However, the DNR was aware of the situation. The department conducted groundwater sampling in late 1999 and indoor air sampling in 2001, according to Renee Bungart, DNR director of communications. At the time, the TCE levels were below the federal screening levels.
However, in late 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) lowered the acceptable level of TCE. Once those levels were changed, the area became a hazard.
When the results from the 2001 tests came back, Bungart said the department made informative materials available at the local library.
Consequences for residents
The residents living in the public housing development are largely African-American. Leaders of the NAACP Missouri State Conference and the organization’s national Environment and Climate Justice Program met with residents last week, and also with Brian May from Governor Jay Nixon’s office.
“It is earth-shattering that the largest number of people living there are in a public housing complex, and we need to look at the consequences for them,” said Adolphus Pruitt, president of the St. Louis City Branch of NAACP and head of Legal Redress and Political Action for the Missouri State Conference.
Pruitt said the governor’s office has been forthright and committed to getting all the facts.
“Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen the same circumstances.” said Jacqueline Patterson, director of NAACP’s Environmental and Climate Justice Program. “A community in Dixon, Tennessee is dealing with an almost identical situation, and others are dealing with similar problems as well.”
Although Missouri Metals LLC currently inhabits the industrial space, the spill occurred under the previous owner, Perkin Elmer. Up until last week, a private contractor, hired and paid for by Perkin Elmer under the orders of DNR, was conducting tests on about a dozen homes, said Chris Whitley of the EPA public affairs office in Kansas City.
The homes tested were a mix of public and private residences, Rollins said. Final results will take about three weeks, but the contractor already informed Rollins that three out of the Housing Authority’s 19 homes in the area exceeded the level of TCE acceptable by federal standards. And one out of its 128 units may have excessive levels as well.
Vapor intrusion
Whitley said DNR asked the EPA to assist with the investigation about a month ago because of the agency’s expertise with vapor intrusion.
“Vapor intrusion can exist when you have chemical contamination in the ground water and that chemical evaporates up through the soil and gets trapped in the homes,” he said.
Whitley made the distinction that the groundwater is being tested – not water that comes out of the tap.
“When we say ‘problem in ground water,’ we mean naturally moving water that comes from runoff, rain storms, washing your car in the front yard. That sort of water,” he said.
So far the investigation is in the early stages, he said. Investigators will test a handful of homes first, and then expand further into the community if those tests show high levels.
At this time, Whitley said the EPA doesn’t have reason to believe there is a health risk with children playing in the soil. The main risk is vapor intrusion. To mitigate homes where the vapors are coming through the basement or first levels, the DNR has installed exhaust and ventilation fans, which sucks the air out of the lower level of the homes, he said.
Several residents have said that they were not able to attend the public meeting that the Housing Authority held this month and have no means of getting more information on the situation to ease their concerns.
Both the EPA and the Department of Natural Resources said they plan to hold more public informational meetings soon. The American will make this information available to the public.
