State environmental regulators have found high levels of dioxins in
sediment in the Willamette Slough in Salem, and warn that eating fish
caught in the area could be unsafe.
The city of Salem, which owns the parks bordering the slough, posted signs Tuesday warning against eating fish caught there.
The
contamination may have come from the former Boise Cascade pulp and
paper mill, which operated between 1962 and 1982 and used a chlorine
bleaching process, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality said
Tuesday.
The “screening level” for dioxins in sediment is 0.001
parts per trillion, said Mike Kucinski, DEQ Western Region cleanup
manager.
Samples from the slough came in between 5.5 and 67.9 parts per trillion.
“That
does point to it being potentially problematic for people eating fish
out there,” said Travis Williams, executive director of Willamette
Riverkeeper. “I haven’t seen a lot of this contamination definitively
described in the Willamette River above the Portland Harbor.”
It also could pose problems for wildlife, including a heron rookery close by, he said.
DEQ has been working with the company to clean up the site for more than a decade.
The
dioxin testing was funded by a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
State and Tribal Response Grant. It began in April, and the final report
was completed June 29.
DEQ will work with Boise Cascade over the
next few months to complete further sediment and fish tissue studies,
Kucinski said. If unsafe levels of dioxin are found in fish tissue, the
Oregon Health Authority may issue a consumption advisory.
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