Epa Issues Response To Its Critics Letter Says Chenoweth-Hage’S Report On Cleanup Included Errors And Mischaracterizations

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has submitted a five-page response to a hefty critique by Rep. Helen Chenoweth-Hage of the cleanup in Silver Valley.

The EPA’s response - released this week - calls information in the critique “either factually in error or a mischaracterization of our work in the Silver Valley.”

Chenoweth-Hage last month published a 60-page report accusing the EPA of wasting millions of taxpayer dollars on cleanup with “questionable results.”

The EPA defends cleanup efforts conducted with the state of Idaho and mining companies, citing dramatic decreases in the average blood-lead level of children at Bunker Hill.

“We are absolutely confident that the cleanup of yards, public areas, rights of way and commercial properties has resulted in a healthier place for the children of the Silver Valley to live,” an enclosure with the letter states.

Cleanup activities included removing lead-laced soil from more than 1,700 residential and commercial properties and removing 2.5 million cubic yards of tailings from the South Fork of the Coeur d’Alene River and tributary gulches and streams, according to EPA officials.

The average blood-lead level in Bunker Hill children dropped from 40 to 4 micrograms per deciliter over the past 15 to 20 years, the letter states.

Accusations from Chenoweth-Hage and other EPA critics that buried waste from Bunker Hill is leaching toxic metals into the South Fork are unproven, the letter continues.

“I hope this response will aid in the development and promotion of a more constructive dialogue between the government, you and your staff and the citizens we serve,” wrote the agency’s regional chief, Chuck Findley.

On Tuesday, Findley met with members of the Shoshone Natural Resources Coalition in Kellogg. The coalition formed in part to counter EPA plans for Superfund expansion outside the 21-square-mile Bunker Hill site.

When the EPA response letter came up at the end of the hourlong session, Liz Arnold, a coalition leader, found Findley’s attitude encouraging.

“He’s willing to start a dialogue and address things wrong in (Chenoweth-Hage’s) report as well as things EPA was wrong about,” Arnold said. “The fact they would even reach out in that way is a sign of progress in my mind.”

Chenoweth-Hage, however, was disappointed in the letter. She released a statement criticizing the EPA’s “vague assurances that all is well and the usual bureaucratic insistence that critics of the agency’s actions just don’t understand.”

The agency’s activities at Bunker Hill require close scrutiny before the EPA expands cleanup to the rest of the Coeur d’Alene River Basin, Chenoweth-Hage said.

“They’re claiming credit for lead reductions they didn’t accomplish. Nature did that,” agreed free-lance writer David Bond, a longtime local reporter and columnist now based in Kellogg.

Bond and others claim that children’s blood lead levels at the Bunker Hill Superfund site already were dropping by the time removal of contaminated soils started.

“They shut the smelter down and the problem went away,” Bond said.

The EPA plans to issue a more detailed response to several specific technical issues raised during an Oct. 24 meeting hosted by Chenoweth-Hage in Kellogg.

But the agency won’t be providing a point-by-point response, EPA attorney Cliff Villa said.

“It seems we are just operating under some different assumptions,” Villa said. “EPA and the state of Idaho believe there’s a problem that needs to be addressed. It seems others are questioning whether a problem exists at all.”

This sidebar appeared with the story: WHAT’S NEXT EPA response

The EPA plans to issue a more detailed response to several specific technical issues raised during an Oct. 24 meeting hosted by Rep. Helen Chenoweth-Hage in Kellogg.

But the agency won’t be providing a point-by-point response, EPA attorney Cliff Villa said.