Dust under roads tainted?

FAIRFIELD — Old tailings from a gold mine in Manning Canyon are stirring a dust-up over some of Fairfield's roads — and residents might have to think twice about inhaling the area's air.

According to a recent study released by the Environmental Protection Agency, at least three of Fairfield's roads have abnormally high levels of arsenic just beneath their chip-seal surfaces.

Fairfield Mayor Linn Gillies says heavy trucks have been damaging the roads and exposing the arsenic-laden soil, which could be harmful to those who inhale the poisonous particles for an extended period of time.

"If that chip seal gets broke up, there's 3,700 parts per million of arsenic in the air," Gillies said. "That's why I've been on these truckers, because they're oversized. They're overweight, and our roads are not built out here in Fairfield to be anything more than substandard county roads."

A lawsuit was filed against the town for its efforts to enact a weight restriction on the crumbling road and keep a group of local farmers from driving on the failing section.

To gain evidence for the lawsuit, Gillies requested the EPA study the roads for the presence of arsenic underneath the gravel surface.

According to Gillies, Utah County used tainted tailings from a nearby abandoned mine to fill the chip-seal in the road decades ago.

The EPA and Department of Environmental Quality studied the site in January and found measurements on 1540 North, the intersection of 1540 North and state Route 73 and 18150 West that had high readings of arsenic. The readings support the theory that the poisonous tailings were used in the road's construction, said Al Lange, EPA on-scene coordinator who oversaw the study in Fairfield, but the arsenic's origin can't scientifically be proven.

Although the EPA has a standard — 10 parts per billion — for acceptable levels of arsenic in water, limitations for arsenic concentration in soil is determined on a case by case basis.

According to Lange, the arsenic in Fairfield isn't a health hazard because it is contained under a chip-seal layer.

"There isn't any imminent danger to anybody, so we can't do anything," Lange said.

More studies will be done later this summer — when the ground dries and becomes dusty — on the levels of arsenic that are present in the air when the ground beneath is exposed.

Gillies says the cost to repair the road is more than the fledgling city, which was incorporated in 2004, can afford. The group of farmers has offered to repair the road with another coat of chip-seal, but Gillies says the fix would be insufficient and temporary.

"I'm just at my wits end trying to figure out how to get a safe place for residents to be and how to get people to visit Camp Floyd (and Stagecoach Inn State Park) without being in danger of arsenic inhalation," Gillies said. "We're just a baby city and we're trying to take our first steps."

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