Seacoastonline article published August 6, 2020 by Jeff McEnemy
Members of the Pease Restoration Advisory Board criticized Air Force and state officials for not providing safe water to five homeowners whose wells have tested higher than New Hampshire’s new maximum levels for PFAS contaminants.
“It seems wrong that these people are drinking this water,” RAB member Andrea Amico said Wednesday. She noted the Newington homeowners are “drinking water with PFAS in it that the state of New Hampshire says isn’t safe.”
RAB member and former state Rep. Mindi Messmer asked during the board’s video conference meeting if the Air Force was “going to comply” with the state’s PFAS standards, which she said are “much lower” than Environmental Protection Agency standards. Roger Walton, of the Air Force Civil Engineer Center, as he did during a December RAB meeting, said the Air Force “still operates under the EPA lifetime health advisory.”
Messmer questioned a state Department of Environmental Services official about the issue during the meeting. Peter Sandin, a hydrogeologist and project manager for DES, said his department told the Newington homeowners about their PFAS levels “back in early October 2019.” He said the Air Force has not been providing the homeowners with “alternative water supplies.” Sandin added he was “not sure what homeowners have chosen to do.” He said DES is “no longer providing bottled water to individual well owners” and that’s up to “the responsible party,” meaning the Air Force. Messmer said she was “dismayed” by the situation. “This has been going on for a year now.” She maintained the state provided bottled water to homeowners before and it has a responsibility to “protect public health in New Hampshire.”
RAB member and Newington Selectman Ted Connors said government officials have “been kicking this can down the road for years.” “We’re talking about people here, we’re talking about families and lives, we’re not talking about numbers only,” Connors said. “Nobody can move the bureaucrats and the bureaucrats are burying us.”
RAB member Lulu Pickering called the handling of the issue “totally unacceptable.” “We’ve got the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services who has these standards who don’t want to spend this money because the Air Force is the responsible party,” Pickering said. “What is happening at this RAB meeting is totally wrong,” she added, urging all RAB members to sign a letter to the Air Force about the Newington wells. “Something has to be done and it’s gone on long enough.”
RAB member Peggy Lamson, who is also a member of the Pease Development Authority Board of Directors, said the situation has gone on “too long and I’m tired of it.” “I’m tired of what is happening to the town of Newington,” Lamson said, and credited Messmer for her work on the issue. “Who in the world does the Air Force think they are?”
RAB member and Newington resident Mike Donahue said what he found “particularly disconcerting is that there is no mention by either NHDES or EPA of any timeline for taking action on this.” “We’re told that they know about it and they’re considering it, but there’s no indication of when that will come to conclusion,” he said. “Meanwhile there are citizens that are suffering.”
Gov. Chris Sununu signed into law July 23 a bill setting some of nation’s toughest drinking water standards. The bill includes standards put forth last year by DES for potentially harmful chemicals called perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known collectively as PFAS. The standards limit one chemical to a maximum of 12 parts per trillion and another to 15 ppt, far lower than the EPA’s 70 ppt standard.
Walton said the Air Force is still following the EPA’s lifetime health advisory for PFAS and PFOA. Thousands of people working at Pease International Tradeport, along with children and infants who attended two day cares there, were exposed to multiple PFAS chemicals from contaminated water in the city of Portsmouth-owned Haven well until its closure in 2014. The water was contaminated by firefighting foam used at the base. PFAS are man-made chemicals used in products worldwide since the 1950s, including firefighting foam, non-stick cookware and water-repellent fabrics. They also have a range of applications in the aerospace, aviation, automotive and electronics industries, among others. In addition to being a suspected carcinogen, the Agency For Toxic Substances and Disease Registry states PFAS exposure can harm childhood development, increase cholesterol levels, hurt the immune system and interfere with the human body’s hormones.
Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.