Senator George's statement is as follows;
I'd like to make some comments regarding Senate Resolution No.49 which we adopted today on the consent calendar. I wanted to begin be thanking the Legislative Service Bureau for their timely work in the turnaround of this resolution which I brought to them on short notice because of an important issue which has come up in southwest Michigan.
This resolution relates to the Kalamazoo River Superfund site. You will recall that this is the largest federal Superfund site in Michigan. It's 80 miles of the Kalamazoo River and an additional three miles of the Portage Creek. The reason it is a Superfund site is because it is laden with PCB sediments from years of paper industry production. Of course, the hazards of PCBs were not known at the time. They are not being produced anymore or deposited in the river, but they remain there from years of prior production.
Recently, there was a signed mediation agreement for cleanup of one section of the river, the Plainwell impoundment section behind the Plainwell Dam which the state actually owns. It calls for removal of the sediment behind the dam and then disposal in a landfill. It has generated some local controversy because the landfill which is proposed as the receptacle for this is located in a residential area within the city of Kalamazoo.
It also raises a larger question that is regarding the long-term storage plans not just for this sediment, but also for future sediment that is to be cleaned from the river. This segment of the river only accounts for about two percent of the PCBs. So it raises the question about where are the remaining 98 percent of the PCBs going to go? This landfill site apparently was chosen because there is a shortage of qualified sites which are allowed to accept PCBs, so it raises the question that if there is a shortage of sites, then where will we put the rest of the PCBs that are going to be removed from the river?
Certainly, the department must be thinking about this. It must be considering its options, and they might include qualifying other sites to receive PCBs. They might include incineration or transport of this material out of state. In any event, because we have this question before us, this resolution calls on the DEQ and the EPA to hold a public hearing to explain and explore the options for future PCB disposal.
I appreciate the support of the Senate on this issue.