Dow commits to cleaning dioxin from Saginaw playground

West Michigan Park, Saginaw Township, Mich. (Photo: MDEQ)

For nearly a year, state and federal officials have sought a cleanup of dioxin contamination at a public park in Saginaw Township. On Tuesday, just as Dow Chemical appealed to the state Supreme Court to stop a class-action lawsuit by residents of the Tittabawassee flood plain, the company promised to develop a plan to clean up the park.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), dioxin levels almost six times the federal limit have been detected in soil at West Michigan Park.

“EPA views the park and nearby areas as meriting cleanup,” EPA spokesman Mick Hans said via e-mail. “Of nearly 300 samples (289 soil samples collected between 0-12 inches deep) analyzed, 27 percent exceeded EPA’s residential threshold of 1,000 parts per trillion [ppt]. Samples [from the park] range as high as 5,900 ppt.”

Dioxin, a byproduct of a chemical manufacturing process, disrupts hormones and causes cancer, and no safe level of exposure has been determined.

In a press release distributed by the EPA, the agency spoke positively of the anticipated cleanup, although it has not yet received or approved a detailed work plan from Dow.

“The West Michigan Park cleanup marks the sixth Superfund removal of dioxin contamination EPA has supervised in the Tri-Cities area since July 2007,” EPA Acting Regional Administrator Bharat Mathur stated in the release. “We’ll be devoting extra attention to the areas of the park where children play.”

Contaminated park was never closed

The EPA’s announcement referred repeatedly to the re-opening of the park, and though the park may be closed when remediation work begins, local officials said that access to the contaminated park has never been restricted.

Saginaw Township Director of Public Services Sonny Grunwell said the state and federal agencies “have been claiming no health hazards.” But the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) has installed hand-washing stations and posted signs recommending people use them after contact with the soil, he noted.

Grunwell said that he’s been told that Dow will now come up with a plan to remove soil from the park, replace some concrete with asphalt and stabilize the river bank. The company has also proposed to remove the playground equipment and have it cleaned, he said.

Michelle Hurd Riddick of the local environmental group Lone Tree Council expressed frustration with the approach public officials and Dow have taken to the contamination at the park.

“NOTHING was done to keep children out of the park,” she said in an e-mailed statement. “Cleaning up the park is a good thing but the EPA and DEQ should not be so quick to aggrandize their collaborative efforts—if the park’s remediation warranted a federal Order on Consent, negotiated behind closed doors, and the bluster of a press release—perhaps EPA and MDEQ should have shut the park down.”

The park contamination stems from decades of production of products such as Saran Wrap, Agent Orange, and pesticides at Dow’s Midland plant, from which dioxin has spread into the Tittabawassee River and 50 miles downstream through the Saginaw River watershed. Flooding of the river has spread dioxin-contaminated sediments into nearby low-lying areas.

Scientists at the EPA have found that the youngest are most vulnerable to dioxin’s harmful effects. One 1994 report found that minute levels — close to those experienced as background levels among the general population –can disrupt fetal development and damage the immune system of the developing child.

Despite the apparent health threat posed by dioxin contamination, in the face of pressure by industry, including Dow, the EPA has yet to release an official assessment of the chemical.

Slideshow of West Michigan Park in Saginaw Township, Mich.: