The Superfund program was established during the Carter administration. It requires chemical and manufacturing companies to pay for cleaning up thousands of contaminated sites around the country. Sixteen such sites are in Georgia. They're part of the EPA's National Priority List or NPL.
The $5 million dollars heading toward Fort Valley is part of President Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Fort Valley officials say the Woolfolk site will become the nexus of its redevelopment efforts in an area which includes downtown Fort Valley as well as Fort Valley State University.
Woolfolk sits close to downtown Fort Valley and to the state university which bears the city's name. Since the site was deemed eligible for Superfund in 1990, 27 million dollars has been spent to partially cleanup its 31-acres. Fort Valley mayor Dr. John Stumbo knows the site's history.
Woolfolk sits close to downtown Fort Valley and to the state university which bears the city's name. Since the site was deemed eligible for Superfund in 1990, 27 million dollars has been spent to partially cleanup its 31-acres. Fort Valley mayor Dr. John Stumbo knows the site's history.
"The Woolfolk Chemical Plant started operations there in about 1924. They made agricultural pesticides that were arsenic lace. In those days, of course, there was no air conditioning and because of the heat, most of the mixing of this dry material was done in sheds that simply had a roof and no side walls. So, as the winds blew through there, it would carry this contamined dust all over the area. The second company came in there in the 1970s, they were called Canada in Georgia, and they were doing the same thing."
Recently, Fort Valley's City Council voted to designate Woolfolk part of its redevelopment plan. But, commercial developers have shied away from the area since in some places contaminated soil remains below the surface. So, instead the City Council is considering a recreation center and Fort Valley's mayor says he'd like a new police academy. And, there is also this idea from Fort Valley State University.
"They're trying to develop plants that indeed clean on their own by their growing process, contaminants out of soils. Well, this would be an ideal situation, because there is still some contamination in the soil."
In the early 1980s, citizen complaints prompted the Georgia environmental officials to investigate Woolfolk amid allegations of discharge of waste products into a drainage corridor heading away from the site. No injuries have been reported but one lawsuit forced a former Woolfolk owner to reimburse residents for declining property values.
Today, according to the US EPA, all excavation of arsenic from residential soil is complete, as well as the removal of arsennic contaminated dust from residential attics.
Finally, in 2002, then President Bush elmininated the Superfund tax for chemical companies, which generated approximately $1 billion dollars a year. The Obama administration has reinstated the program starting in 2011, which is expected to add about $17 billion dollars over ten years to the program.
Fort Valley hopes this latest infusion of $5 million dollars from President Obama's stimulus plan will complete the cleanup of Woolfolk, fulfilling its promise of downtown revitalization.
