Saturday, July 17, 1999
Court may pay for study of sewage plant
Some say water supply in danger
BY PATRICK CROWLEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
BURLINGTON — Boone County Fiscal Court may pay for an environmental study to determine how a proposed sewage treatment plant could affect the water supply in western Boone County.
A group of county residents opposed to construction of the plant have said that based on their research, raw sewage or chemical byproducts of its treatment could contaminate an underground aquifer running beneath the Ohio River.
Residents of Belleview Bottoms and students at Kelly Elementary School, both just downriver from the proposed plant site in western Boone County, get their drinking water from wells drilled into the aquifer.
“Our biggest fear is what could happen to our drinking water if that plant is built,” said Boone County resident Alice Ryle, one of the opposition group's leaders.
Boone County Deputy Judge-executive John Stanton met Wednesday with representatives of the Environmental Resource Management Center at Northern Kentucky University in Highland Heights.
“We've asked them to give us a proposal on some of the issues” related to the plant, Mr. Stanton said Friday, “including the issues related to claims of potential ground-water contamination, and the claimed impact on the aquifer.”
Mr. Stanton said fiscal court is considering the study because the opposition group has pushed for a third party to consider the environmental impact of the plant, being proposed by Sanitation District No. 1 in Fort Wright.
“There are some uncer tainties and some legitimate concerns,” said Lee Otte, director of the environmental center.
“Those concerns may not be real, but the questions are legitimate to be asked. Someone needs to address them ... and the (fiscal court) has approached us about providing a neutral third-party review,” Mr. Otte said Friday.
The cost or the time frame has not yet been determined, he said.
John Arrasmith of Belleview Bottoms, the opposition group's leader and spokesman, said the study should have been conducted before the western Boone County site was selected for the treatment plant.
“It's about time,” Mr. Arrasmith said. “We've been saying these things for weeks, but we're the ones who originally supplied the information and brought up the concerns in the first place.”
Mr. Arrasmith, a mechanical engineer, and other members of the group have researched the environmental impact of the plant and are convinced a potential for con tamination exists.
“That haven't even bothered to look into these things until we started talking about it,” Mr. Arrasmith said. “These are things that should have been done a long time ago. Where have our leaders been?”
Sanitation District officials have said the plant will not damage the environment or contaminate the region's drinking water.
“We invite the independent analysis,” said district manager Jeff Eger. “We're confident it will confirm and reaffirm what we've said all along, that the plant won't damage the water supply. We're even going to have our own well on the site that will supply our employees with water.”
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