EARTH DAY

Drinking water safe, but threats remain

Farm runoff’s effects reach Gulf of Mexico

Michele Simmons, a compliance coordinator with the Dayton Department of Water Division of Environmental Management, is on the roof of City Hall. The display was set up on June 13. Staff photo by Ron Alvey

Ron Alvey Michele Simmons, a compliance coordinator with the Dayton Department of Water Division of Environmental Management, is on the roof of City Hall. The display was set up on June 13. Staff photo by Ron Alvey

ENLARGE PHOTO

Dayton's drinking water has not always been so clean and abundant. A 1987 fire at a Sherwin-Williams plant threatened the area's drinking water. As a result, Dayton established a wellfield protection program. File photo

Bill Garlow Dayton's drinking water has not always been so clean and abundant. A 1987 fire at a Sherwin-Williams plant threatened the area's drinking water. As a result, Dayton established a wellfield protection program. File photo

ENLARGE PHOTO

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By Tom Beyerlein, Staff Writer Updated 11:01 PM Saturday, April 17, 2010

DAYTON — In the 40 years since the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, the Dayton area has made great strides in containing and even reversing environmental degradation due to toxic industrial chemicals.

But as another Earth Day approaches on Thursday, the impact of pollution is still evident. The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency in February tightened fish-consumption limits for parts of the Great Miami River, and while restrictions were unchanged in the immediate Dayton area, fish sampled here contain PCBs — polychlorinated biphenyls — and mercury.

In the Upper Great Miami Watershed in Shelby and Logan counties, environmentalists are finding fish with deformities, fin erosion, lesions and tumors not seen since the bad old days of open industrial dumping. Officials believe the deformities are caused not by industrial toxins, but by runoff of farm fertilizers that promote algae growth that chokes oxygen out of the water.

Officials also found E. coli contamination in the watershed in 2008 and 2009, according to preliminary results of an Ohio EPA study not yet released.

Fertilizer runoff has far-flung effects: The U.S. Department of Agriculture in November selected the Upper Great Miami as one of 41 watersheds in 12 states to split $320 million to help farmers minimize runoff that contributes to a “dead zone” of oxygen-starved water in the Gulf of Mexico. But implementing the improvements may be difficult due to layoffs at regional soil and water conservation districts.

Preservation of water quality goes far beyond protecting surface water. That was made evident in 1987, when a spectacular fire at a Sherwin-Williams paint warehouse threatened the area’s drinking water. With that scare came some good, however: After the fire, Dayton established an internationally known wellfield protection program.

Today, drinking water here is clean and so abundant it’s used as a marketing tool to lure businesses to the area. But beneath brownfields are pockets of groundwater so polluted by industrial spills that property owners are prohibited from ever using that water again.

“The people of Dayton have a wonderful asset, and that is abundant groundwater,” said Ohio EPA spokeswoman Heather Lauer. “You also have a drawback: a lot of contaminated groundwater. You have a city with an industrial past.”

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