Group wants time with hog-farm data
The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality should allow the public more time to submit questions regarding the test results on a project to detect whether a hog manure pond is leaking on a farm in Mount Judea, a member of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance told the Pollution Control and Ecology Commission on Friday.
Brian Thompson told the commission that his group would have to hire outside researchers to go through the data and that the group would need more than a week to be able to ask good questions of the department.
The question-and-answer period ends at noon Friday.
Department Director Becky Keogh told the commission last Friday that the department wanted the period to end Dec. 9 to conduct a more expeditious review of the test results.
The alliance also issued a release lamenting that only one hole was drilled into the ground at C&H Hog Farms in the Buffalo National River watershed during the research process, which involved taking samples at various depths below the farm’s surface. The alliance also expressed continued concerns that C&H poses a pollution risk to the Buffalo River.
State-funded research so far has drawn no conclusions.
The Arkansas Farm Bureau also issued a news release Friday saying its environmental experts had looked at the data and “they say it’s clear the team at C&H Hog Farms is doing the right things and are good stewards of the environment, as well as good neighbors to the Buffalo River watershed.”
Samples taken at C&H were tested for 18 nutrients and minerals, although not every sample was tested for all 18. The results mostly were within the parameters set by the U.S. Geological Survey, except where the Geological Survey did not have comparable data, according to a presentation Thursday by state contractor Harbor Environmental.
Soil leachate samples showed higher concentrations of the nutrients and elements below the ponds but still fit within Geological Survey parameters when applicable. The Geological Survey did not always have comparable data for nitrogen, phosphorus or total organic carbon. No soil samples detected E. coli, and ammonia was found above Geological Survey levels in one of five water samples.
Special-programs director selected
The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality has hired Michael Grappe as director of special programs, department Director Becky Keogh said Friday.
Grappe, who previously worked as executive director of the Saline County Regional Solid Waste Management District, will have the department’s waste tire program as his first priority, department spokesman Kelly Robinson said.
This fall, Grappe helped Rep. Lanny Fite, R-Benton, compile a report on the state’s waste tire districts. The report found that Arkansas’ scrap-tire districts are in poor financial shape and in need of more accountability measures.
Grappe’s salary was still being negotiated, Robinson said.
Wastewater plant appeal dismissed
The Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission voted Friday to dismiss an Arkansas Game and Fish Commission appeal of a wastewater treatment plant permitted by the state Department of Environmental Quality.
The Game and Fish Commission requested its appeal be dropped after the developers of a subdivision outside of Conway signed an agreement with Conway Corp. to get city sewer services instead of building a treatment plant.
The Game and Fish Commission opposed the treatment plant, arguing that a study done by contractor FTN Associates indicated Lake Conway — which would have received the treated wastewater — faced a risk of harmful algal blooms and recommended that no additional discharges be permitted into the lake.
The Department of Environmental Quality disregarded that conclusion, arguing that the data used in the study were moot because a new treatment plant that diverts wastewater from the lake had been opened since the data were compiled.
$18 fee suggested to cover cleanups
A receiver recommended to a Pulaski County circuit judge last month that Ozark Mountain Regional Solid Waste District assess an $18 annual fee on residents in its six-county district to pay for bond issues related to cleanup projects. Judge Tim Fox would determine whether the fee was appropriate.
Bank of the Ozarks petitioned in court for the district, which is a regional operation largely funded by the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, to be taken into receivership because of financial problems in 2014. The bank was trustee for the bonds the district defaulted on. Geoffrey Treece, attorney with Quattlebaum, Grooms and Tull, was appointed receiver in May 2015.
The Ozark Mountain district owns a landfill it is unable to close — the NABORs landfill — and is home to a dump of about 1 million scrap tires that a contractor was unable to dispose of. The Department of Environmental Quality is attempting to clean up the sites, estimating the landfill to cost about $16 million to close and the tire dump about $1 million to clear.
The department plans to seek reimbursement for its work from the district.