BERLIN- Officials outlined plans for groundwater testing at Heron Park this week.
EA Engineering will be digging a variety of small wells at Heron Park in the coming weeks to test groundwater, Town Administrator Jeff Fleetwood told the town council Monday. The testing comes after a chemical spill at the park in June.
“I’m not an engineer, I’m not a scientist, but I feel very confident that that chemical did not seep into that groundwater,” Fleetwood said.
He explained that the town had been contacted by the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) and advised to have groundwater testing performed at Heron Park as a result of the spill of liquid caustic that occurred there in June. He said the testing, which will cost roughly $13,000, was approved by the council in a poll vote via email in the middle of January.
“The correspondence the town did receive from MDE, it wasn’t ‘will you do this’ it was ‘you will do this,’” Fleetwood said.
He said he’d contracted EA Engineering to handle the work because the company had done work there before. EA Engineering will be drilling three shallow water wells where the spill occurred as well as some perimeter wells. Fleetwood said the shallow water wells would be tested for only the chemical that was spilled, the liquid caustic.
“If there is something in those waters, then they’ll go to the perimeter wells and that’s tested,” he said. “If there’s nothing in those initial three wells then these (perimeter) wells will not be tested.”
He said he’d questioned the need to drill perimeter wells but said that EA Engineering had advised him that it was more cost-effective to drill all the wells at once rather than return if perimeter wells were needed.
According to Fleetwood, if a chemical is found in initial wells and the perimeter wells, testing along the aquifer would occur.
“They would begin a process where they’d be testing individual wells at some homes on North Main Street,” he said.
Resident Marie Velong asked if the town would be liable for that.
“We could be,” Fleetwood said.
Councilman Zack Tyndall questioned the poll vote and said he hadn’t been advised of the results. Fleetwood confirmed that a majority of the council had voted to approve the expenditure for the groundwater testing.
Tyndall said he hadn’t voted because he didn’t agree with the fact that the testing was being paid for with money in the water fund contingency.
Mayor Gee Williams said contingency funds were for “things that go bump in the night.”
“This certainly qualifies for that,” Williams said.
Tyndall asked that the meeting minutes include the poll vote as well as the email he sent his peers advising why he wouldn’t vote to approve the water testing.
“I just disagree with the way that we’re paying for it,” he said. “That’s it. I have that right. You all have the right to vote the way you feel as well.”
When asked after the meeting about his objections to the expense, Tyndall said he had recommended creating a repayment schedule from the general fund to the water fund if water fund money was being used to pay EA Engineering. He said he never saw the necessary votes come through via email so assumed no final decision had been made. He thought the item would be discussed at the next council meeting.
“I didn’t learn about the expense being approved until Mayor Williams mentioned it during the open session of our meeting on Monday night,” he said. “As I stated during the open session, I disagree with how the groundwater testing was paid for using the water fund. Our enterprise funds should not be used as a zero-interest piggy bank without any plan for repayment. Without any opportunity to discuss this further with my colleagues in open session, I had no choice but to request that my email be made part of the public meeting minutes for this agenda item.”
