Dredging site sparks debate
Thursday, October 12, 2006
BARRIE BARBER THE SAGINAW NEWS

A member of the Saginaw County Board of Commissioners wants his colleagues to declare that a Saginaw River dredging site is off-limits to "hazardous or highly toxic contaminants" outside the upper Saginaw River shipping channel.

Responding to environmentalist fears, Commissioner Tim Novak gained the backing of members of the board's County Services Committee, who this week approved a resolution that makes the declaration.

The full board still must consider it.

The site, also known as the Dredge Materials Disposal Facility, straddles Frankenlust Township in Bay County and Zilwaukee Township in Saginaw County, part of which is in Novak's district.

"We need to draw a line now," the Carrollton Township Democrat said. "This facility is being built strictly to keep the shipping channel open so we can move the boats in and out of there."

Novak said he is reacting to concerns that Dow Chemical Co. may want to dispose of contaminants from its Midland complex at the dredging site. If that's the case, he said, Dow should look on its own property first.

The Lone Tree Council, an environmental group, called a press conference last month to highlight a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency memo last April it said showed Dow had an interest in the spoils disposal site.

Dow spokesman John C. Musser said the company is exploring the potential for using the site, and its interest had sprung from the possibility that a regulatory agency could order Dow to dredge contaminated rivers.

Musser said Novak's concerns are "a little ahead of the game."

"There's no indication whether (Dow dredging the river) is even necessary," he said. "Nobody's made any commitments one way or another. There have been no negotiations to use the site."

Robert McCann, spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Quality, said Dow's use of the facility is not an option right now.

"Many steps would have to be taken to even bring that up," he said. "At this point, the bottom line is it's not something we're currently even considering."

Such an undertaking would require the approval of both the DEQ and Army Corps of Engineers, which oversees the building of the site.

Dow had contributed between $300,000 and $500,000 to the Saginaw River Alliance, a group of dock owners who gave more than

$1.5 million to the $5 million project, the spokesman said in September.

County Public Works Commissioner James A. Koski, who like Novak is a Democrat, said federal and state permits do not allow the disposal of hazardous waste or anything other than material from the upper Saginaw River.

"I have no trouble with (the position) at all because that's all it's been planned for," he told committee members. "You, as the owner, will always have the right to say what goes in there. Our goal is to get the river dredged."

Commissioner Kenneth B. Horn, a Frankenmuth Republican, said he is disappointed and frustrated with the "unusual alliance" between the DEQ and the Lone Tree Council, which he termed "an extreme left wing special interest group."

Horn is running against Democratic Commissioner Bob Blaine for a state House seat.

"(Members of the Lone Tree Council) have been cozy with the DEQ, and they're getting the information before we as commissioners and legislators are," he complained.

Michelle Hurd Riddick, a Lone Tree spokeswoman, said the group legally obtained the information about Dow through a Freedom of Information Act request filed with the Chicago EPA office, not the state DEQ.

"That Commissioner Horn would focus on the citizens' right to access information rather than addressing the issue, I think it speaks volumes," she said. "Are we to interpret that citizens shouldn't have this information?

"Everything about this site needs to be transparent, and all of the documents surrounding this site, whether they come from DEQ or EPA, that information belongs to the people of Saginaw County."

Horn said "pure sunlight" has highlighted every county conversation about the disposal facility. v

Staff Writer Justin Engel contributed to this report.

©2006 Saginaw News

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