Friday, July 30, 1999
Mt. Orab tap water defended
BY PAUL BARTON
Enquirer Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON — Mount Orab, Ohio, officials denied Thursday that their tap water has the dangerous levels of herbicide alleged in a report from the Environmental Working Group, an environmental research and advocacy group.
The Environmental Working Group listed Mount Orab as one of six Southwestern Ohio communities where levels of atrazine in tap water expose residents, especially infants and children, to far higher cancer risks than they should face.
Atrazine, the most widely used herbicide in the United States, is associated with corn production.
"No longer a problem'
“It's no longer a problem,” said Fred Kirker, superintendent of utilities for Mount Orab.
Since the village installed a $17,000 filtering system in late 1998, he said, tests show atrazine amounts to be far less than 1 part per billion.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency requires that atrazine levels be held to 3 parts per billion or less, although that standard is under review.
In several of the most recent tests, Mr. Kirker said, atrazine has been “below detectable levels.”
The village tests its water every other week.
Four years of data
The Environmental Working Group's study was based on data from 1994 through 1998 that it obtained from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.
Jane Houlihan, researcher for the group, said test data from as recently as July 1998 showed atrazine present at 9.85 parts per billion in Mount Orab, which is almost three times the current federal standard.
Mount Orab officials said that was before the new filtering system.
“I'm not saying there wasn't some in it (in the past),” Mr. Kirker said.
The Environmental Working Group said children in Mount Orab exceed what should be their lifetime cancer risk at the age of 3.7 months and that lifetime residents have a cancer risk equivalent to 17.4 times what it should be under the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act.
The 1996 act, the group says, should result in a federal atrazine standard of 1.4 parts per billion instead of the current 3 parts per billion.
It is critical of the U.S. EPA for not revising the standard. Federal EPA officials said the matter is still under review.
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