Cleanup On St. Joe Set To Begin Workers Will Try To Excavate Contaminated Soil Before Spring

Work to remove toxic creosote from the St. Joe River shoreline at St. Maries is expected to begin Monday.

The first step is to excavate all tainted soil within 10 feet of the river, said Greg Weigel of the federal Environmental Protection Agency. The goal is to finish before the river swells from spring runoff.

“The idea is to remove that much while the river levels are low, and then determine an approach for the larger remediation,” Weigel said Wednesday.

Creosote is an oily, cancer-causing substance that was once used to treat wood poles at the site. A treatment plant operated there from 1935 to 1964. The land off Railroad Avenue is now leased by the city of St. Maries to Carney Products Co. Ltd., which uses it to store and transfer untreated poles.

Carney Products and the city are cooperating in the cleanup. They have hired a consulting firm, EMCON, to do the work.

EMCON engineer Jeff Lower estimated Wednesday that the work will take two or three weeks. The extent of the contamination hasn’t been determined, he said.

Rob’s Demolition of Spokane has been hired to do the work.

The contaminated soil will be temporarily stockpiled on the site before being hauled to a toxic waste dump, probably in Washington, Weigel said.

“You can’t haul sloppy soil,” he explained.

The water will be allowed to drain off. It will be collected in a tank and shipped off with the soil.

The cleanup has been estimated to cost $1.3 million. City officials claim that the federal government, and not St. Maries, owns the land and must ultimately pay for the work. The EPA is researching the land ownership question.