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Tests turn up no toxins at county sites By DANI DODGE Testing turned up no contamination in soils that were taken from two county waste sites where a watchdog group expressed concern about dumping. Joe Strahl, county director for roads parks and planning, said it was the result he expected. "But we wanted to satisfy ourselves again that we didn't have a problem with anything leaching out of the creosote timbers," he said. Jackson County hired Atlas Environmental to test some soil samples after the Jackson County Citizens Group, a right-wing government watchdog organization, expressed concerns about two areas: one where the county stockpiles old bridge timbers and another where it put some soil that had been removed from roadside ditches. The group has expressed concerns about the toxicity of the creosote used on the timbers and about toxins that may be in the dirt. Coal-tar creosote, a complex mixture of many chemicals, is the most widely used wood preservative in the United States. But, some of the chemicals in creosote can have harmful health effects if ingested. Creosote is used as a wood preservative, most commonly known as the black tar-like substance found on telephone poles. The testing, though, showed the creosote did not leach into the soil. There also were no contaminants at the site where the county put ditch soil. County officials will present their findings at the Jackson County Board of Commissioners meeting in the Old County Courthouse auditorium at 9:30 a.m. today. Last month, the county put some roadside ditch soil at a site at the Denman Wildlife area in White City, which came to the attention of the citizens group. Then the county's storage of old bridge timbers at the Military Stockpile site off Antioch Road also came to light. The two sites are about a half-mile from each other. The lumber at the Military Stockpile appears to be treated with heavy oil that likely contains creosote, according to the report by Plato Doundoulakis, owner of Atlas Environmental. Doundoulakis said the lumber "is not considered a waste and the Department of Environmental Quality does not regulate its storage if it is recycled or reused." Strahl, said the timbers are there for Jackson County citizens to take for fence posts and barn timbers. Most of it is from a wood bridge that was replaced with a concrete bridge in February, he said. "The ones that are most visible have been out there a matter of a couple months," Strahl said. "We'll reuse the timbers we can reuse, and the rest will be landfilled." Doundoulakis said that after analysis confirms they are not hazardous, the timbers treated with creosote can be burned as fuel at the Biomass One cogeneration power plant or dumped at Dry Creek Landfill. And although the soil samples taken by Atlas Environmental showed no contamination, Curt Chancellor, of the citizens group said that his group is doing its own soils testing. "I hope they don't find something," Chancellor said. "If they do, it will cost the citizens. "But we have to make sure." At the meeting, several members of the citizens group expect to present their own findings about problems with the way the county stores its old bridge timbers. Reach reporter Dani Dodge at 776-4471, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.