From:info@cleanasheville.org
Sent: Thursday, May 28, 2009 5:24 PM
Subject: CTS UPDATE: New NCDENR Secretary Visits CTS in Secret

PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release

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info@cleanasheville.org

New Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources Comes to Asheville to Visit CTS Groundwater Contamination Site in Secret

Asheville, NC - Late last week, ahead of the Memorial Day holiday, newly appointed Secretary of the North Carolina Department of the Environment and Natural Resources, Dee Freeman visited the CTS of Asheville site and met in secret with undisclosed officials.

The ill-disclosed manner in which the visit was made came as a surprise and to the dismay of the citizens and the leaders of two groups representing the citizens in a public capacity for a full, proper and timely cleanup of the site. Seen as a disservice to the new governor, Beverly Purdue, neither the Buncombe County appointed CTS Citizen's Monitory Council nor the Mills Gap Community Advisory Group for the site, which has standing with US EPA) were included in any meetings, either separately or together with officials. Nor were they notified of the visit in advance or afterward.

The inadvertant discovery was made today by citizens, who continue to be concerned about the handling of the site by state and federal officials, since the site was abandoned by the CTS Corporation in the late 1980's. These concerns about disclosure and endangerment from non-disclosure were first raised publicly and written about in an August 26, 1999 feature editorial by the Asheville-Citizen Times Editorial Board.

Upon alarming US EPA followup studies, the site came to be deemed an "imminent hazard" and a "time critical" concern in April 2002, that if delayed or not dealt with and completed would be pose an increasing endangerment to the multitude down-gradient wells and springs. The site and the contamination source is situated under the old plant building atop Mills Gap on Mills Gap Road and only recently has been showing increased levels in nearby wells and springs first identified ten years ago. The source areas of the site is situated at the headwaters of Dingle Creek which travels five miles westward through the Crowfields Condominium development and the Biltmore Ramble property, before merging with the French Broad River.

In early 2002, the state referred the problem to US EPA, because it did not have the resources to contend with situation under its own imminent hazard provisions under state laws. The urgency and the federal take-over obviated the need for the state to invoke its own declaration on the state's imminent hazards sites statute.

Trichloroethylene (TCE) is the same contaminant, that U.S. Senator Kay Hagan has addressed concern about at Camp Lejeune Naval Airstation in Jacksonville, North Carolina, that may have affected as many as many as one million Marine and family members.The toxicity and linked human carcinogencity of TCE is becoming more strongly recognized, as is the increased succeptability to infants and children. In addition, there is an associated growing concern by the United States Environmental Protection Agency for indoor vapor in homes not well-insulated built in areas where there is shallow groundwater contaminated by TCE.

The nature of TCE in grounwater, when not captured or contained as its source, presents new problems distant from its source, due immiscibility in water (like oil) and being heavier than water. Traveling or spreading persistent "globs" of TCE in the water table provide new source areas for localized water contamination, hence the importance and the urgency for "contaminant source control" cannot be over-estimated.

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