Sediments from the Sagianw River enter Lake Huron's Saginaw Bay

Sediments from the Saginaw River enter Lake Huron's Saginaw Bay

The municipal water systems for Bay City, Saginaw and Midland are slated to be screened for dioxin next week as part of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency effort to address citizen concerns that ongoing navigational dredging in the Saginaw River threatens the region’s water supplies.

Bay City’s water superintendent, John DeKam, said his department was informed that beginning the week of July 20, an EPA contractor will conduct tests on the raw water as it comes into the treatment plant and on the finished water that goes into people’s homes.

David Love, superintendent for the Midland water system which shares a water pipeline with Saginaw, said that his department received similar information.

“I think it’s a fine thing that they are doing this,” DeKam said.

Dioxin, a highly toxic and cancer-causing byproduct of the chemical manufacturing process, has migrated from the Dow Chemical complex in Midland, though the Tittabawassee and Saginaw rivers and into Lake Huron’s Saginaw Bay.

The water intake for the Bay City water supply is 6.5 miles from the mouth of the Saginaw River, and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality sampling has found dioxin contamination in the sediments around the water intake. The intake for the system that serves both Saginaw and Midland is at the northern edge of Saginaw Bay near White Stone Point.

In May the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began dredging 600,000 cubic yards of dioxin-contaminated sediments from navigational channels in the lower Saginaw River without sediment traps recommended by state and federal officials as a safety mechanism to prevent downstream migration of dioxin.

Concerned citizens noted that a 1978 EPA report on Saginaw River watershed contamination warned that dioxin from river sediments could migrate downstream and affect area water supplies. They asked that the water supplies be screened for the toxin.

EPA officials initially refused to test the water, stating that the dredging project didn’t show a “strong likelihood” of impacting area water supplies.

However, at a public meeting held by the agency in Saginaw last month, regional administrator Bharat Mathur announced that the agency had changed position and decided to work with state officials to conduct dioxin screening of the water systems.

Saginaw resident Kathy Henry called the scheduling of the tests “very good news.”

“I appreciate EPA taking quick action when asked, on something that’s been a real concern for many area residents for a long time now,” she said via e-mail.