Wednesday, February 13, 2002

Our water is safe, but spill shows reporting system needs improvement

By SALLIE SATTERTHWAITE
sallies@juno.com

From the outset, let me go on record as one who drinks Fayette County water confidently. I say that despite, or perhaps because, of some research I did for a story about residents' claims that there seems to be a disproportionate concentration of leukemia and other cancers in the county.

Actually, I decided it was a non-story. I know a little about how the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control compile statistics. They require a huge number of cases to declare that there are abnormally high clusters of a particular pathology, and those numbers just weren't here.

I've read the recent reports on water analysis here, and again, the CDC numbers are reassuring. Ethylene glycol, for which the FDA sets a limit of seven parts per million (ppm) in drinking water, has been undetected at all 46 test sites around the county. Propylene glycol doesn't get dangerous until it's in the range of 70-100 ppm, and the highest level that showed up in the tests here last month was 17 ppm.

Sure, huge quantities of ethylene glycol can damage human organs and nervous systems, and cause birth defects in animals, but propylene glycol is used as a food additive. Neither has been related in any way to cancer.

Still, I went to the City Hall hearing called by our state representative Kathy Cox last week more out of curiosity than anything else. You can read the details elsewhere in today's Citizen.

As I expected, it was good theater. Kathy acted as moderator, and seemed a paragon of reason among a number of public officials who came off appearing inept or careless, at best. No matter what the question, the response of the handful of officials in the room ranged from shrugging off accountability with one exception, state EPD's Bert Langley: "We blew it" to spreading blame all the way to the pilots requesting de-icing on Jan. 3.

So the issue here has less to do with water than with poor judgment, carelessness, and unpreparedness on the part of those we entrust with our most basic well-being. Accidents like a massive amount of de-icing fluid getting into a drinking water source will happen. The timely reaction of government is really the only safeguard citizens have.

Moving from the water in my refrigerator backwards to its source, step by step, let's trace the safeguards: I use a clear plastic picture with an activated charcoal filter in it. That's not going to block either glycol, but we just think filtered water tastes better. (This despite the fact that I am admittedly both smelling- and tasting-challenged.)

The next safeguard is the water treatment plant where I have witnessed the extensive testing that water goes through before it reaches the pipes under our sink. Daily testing, by the way, that the sources of so-called "pure spring water" people buy from the supermarket shelves are required to undergo only yearly.

(As I looked around the hearing room Friday afternoon, I couldn't help thinking that many of the parents in it would set a hot dog down in front of their kids that evening for supper, or stop by McFatfood's on the way home for a greaseburger and Coke.)

No one from the county water department was at the meeting. Its director "is not good with the public," said a county commissioner later. I've interviewed people in that department and they've educated me on how the system works. Surely someone there is articulate enough to say "yes" or "no" to questions posed by the citizens who pay their salary.

Our county commissioners, three of whom were in the room, said they were there merely to observe, and declined to participate on the panel of officials who were facing their constituency. Kathy would comment only that she "regretted the county's decision not to participate."

Talking later with Commissioner Peter Pfeifer, I learned that miscommunication was the culprit: Commissioner A.G. VanLandingham told Kathy he'd be there with some information and she took that to mean he had accepted her invitation to participate. Once at City Hall, he and Commissioner Linda Wells sat in the audience. Citizen Patty Culjak, most vocal of the civilian whistleblowers, skewered A.G. with a couple of his own remarks, which he denied making.

It's a county system, and responsibility for it does not rest on Peachtree City officials, but when the City Hall began receiving complaints, the city ordered tests. They indicated that the amount of either glycol was well below 1 ppm, hence a non-threat.

OK, the next line of defense: the state's Environmental Protection Dept. At least Langley, its emergency response manager, admitted having dropped the ball by not having a means to receive emergency messages over the weekend. Kathy said later that she was thinking about establishing a "water hotline" so people could call an issue in directly and speak to someone at the state level.

The airport itself is going to review de-icing procedures before fluids are released into the Flint River, according to general manager Ben DeCosta. I'm not sure what it would take to involve the federal EPA, but I guess that's the line of defense farthest from my kitchen sink.

One thing does worry me, however, and was never once mentioned:

In this new post-Sept. 11 world, with public officials everywhere being warned to watch for terrorist activities in the most unlikely and unsuspected places, there is absolutely no excuse for failure to communicate a possible hazard, if not to the public, at least to those who have the power to make decisions based on good judgment.

If someone were to introduce something biologically or chemically lethal into our water system, and a citizen suspected that something had happened, are we to accept that it might be a week before anyone takes action or even issues a warning?

Peter said it pretty well, although on the telephone and not at the hearing: "If it had been something deadly, it would have been here and gone before anyone dropped dead. If nothing else, this incident has moved that situation to be addressed. We will have a water department spokesperson if something like this comes up again.

"A water system [is] a critical system that people have to be able to trust," Peter said.

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