Mayor: No notice given on air test

Environmental inspectors found trash fire in his yard

TONTITOWN — State environmental inspectors found a trash fire in the Tontitown mayor’s backyard Feb. 6, while air quality sampling took place nearby, state documents show.

The city received no advance notice of either the timing or the location of the tests, Mayor Angie Russell said in a telephone interview Wednesday. “We had no idea the tests were taking place that day,” she said. “They did not call us or the Fire Department.”

Neither she nor her husband were aware the sampling had begun, she said.

“My husband was preparing his garden and had some corn stalks and other things to get rid of,” Russell said. The couple gave advance notice to the city Fire Department of their plans and had the department’s permission for the burning, she said.

The city government of Tontitown is appealing to stop expansion of the Eco-Vista landfill, claiming the operations there are both a nuisance and a hazard. Also, Russell was one of several city residents who filed complaints in December of noxious smells surrounding the landfill. This led to a battery of tests by the Arkansas National Guard at the request of the state Division of Environmental Quality.

Those December tests found higher-than-recommended levels of sulfur dioxide, prompting the more extensive testing by the National Guard and a private contractor brought in by the environmental division. Those tests found higher-than-recommended levels of acrolein and benzene, the environmental division reported Friday.

The environmental division’s complaint report involving Russell says an inspector and an administrator for the division were in the area of the fire during the air sampling. They went to the home, but the Russells were out of town, a housekeeper told them. The housekeeper “stated that the materials burned was vegetative waste, interior wood house trim, and a dog food bag,” the report says. The division inspectors did not enter the site because the Russells were not present to give their permission, the report says.

The mayor provided a link to chapter 93 of Tontitown’s city code, giving the city’s permission to burn waste and prescribing how the city Fire Department must be notified first. However, outdoor burning of trash is not allowed by the state Pollution Control and Ecology Commission rules, according to a letter sent by the environmental division to the Russells, dated Feb. 16.

The division “strongly discourages open burning of any material,” the Feb. 16 letter says.

“Should further incidents be validated regarding open burning, that incident as well as any other information pertaining to these incidents may be referred to the Office of Air Quality Enforcement Section and could result in fines of up to $10,000 per incident,” the Feb. 16 letter warns.

The state Department of Energy and Environment, which oversees the environmental division, is coordinating with the Department of Health to evaluate latest air quality results and determine if the landfill or something else is the source of the compounds, according to a letter dated Friday from department Secretary Shane E. Khoury to the mayor and state legislators.