Spreading it around ... again
Back on April 3, 2004, I wrote a column published in the Calhoun Times about some concerns I had about industrial looking trucks spraying or dumping stuff on the pasture land as I drove along my winding country road, Pine Chapel Road.
Something about the trucks gave me pause. At first, I thought it must be chicken litter to fertilize the pastures. It was spring and usually the time to enhance the fields with litter. This had been done for a good while. Chicken litter does not have a good aroma, but I was familiar with it especially during the early spring months. This stuff did not have the smell of chicken litter, but it did smell wrong.
I had heard that the stuff being released was from the wastewater treatment and was sewerage.
It did smell kind of like a septic tank, but it had something else I couldn't identify. So, I made a call to either the water treatment plant ... or maybe it was the city manager's office. This was twenty years ago, after all. The lady I had a conversation with assured me that the sewerage had been treated and was safe. It was good for the soil and was just fine. There was nothing to worry about. So, this is what was being dumped on the beautiful pastures where cattle grazed?
These next few words come directly from the column I wrote twenty years ago.
“Yes, I had been told this stuff had been treated so that it's okay. Treated with what? Chemicals? This makes it okay for what? And when it rains are these chemicals safe if they run out into our rivers and lakes or soak into the earth? Now, I'm not a subversive, but I do have concerns about our environment and “bright ideas.” I kind of want my grandchildren to grow up in a clean world with non-polluted air, land, and waterways. I don't think this is asking too much.”
I had no idea that when I wrote these words, they would come back to haunt me. I had no idea I was prophesizing what is happening right now in our community. What has been dumped on the pastures along our beautiful country road is not just human waste. It seems that someone has allowed carpet companies to dump their wastewater into the water treatment plant.
Carpet contains many chemicals, some of which are known as “forever” chemicals (PFAS or PFOS) because they have a life of 1,000 years. And, these chemicals have been released on pastures. It's called sludge and it's dangerously contaminated. High levels of it have been found in the city's drinking water and in the intake of where the Coosawattee River feeds into the water treatment plant. This is inexcusable.
Here's the thing. I have seen the map where some of the highest levels of PFAs and PFOS, these forever chemicals, are situated. Our home is at “ground zero!” It has been suggested that we not drink city water or wells until tested, don't cook with it, don't water your gardens, don't drink the spring water.
Someone asked me how I felt about all this. I wish my prophecy had not been right, but it was and is. How do I feel? I feel betrayed by the leaders in this community. They allowed poisons to be put on beautiful land to save money. The cost of dumping carpet companies' wastewater is high. This practice of dumping carpet wastewater into the water treatment plants should never had been allowed.
I have questions. Why? Did leaders not know of the forever chemicals? If they didn't, they should have. If a person is in a leadership position, they owe it to their constituents to do what's right.
I consider the Coosawattee River as dear to me as an old friend. Now this old friend is poisoned, and it didn't have to be. Our family land where we have picnics, camping, playing in the river in our special area ... named for a marvelous woman … is damaged.
We call it Evelyn's Eden because it's a little bit of heaven on this Earth ... or it was. We don't go there now, and it makes me sad for the legacy of Troy and Evelyn Causby. I am heartbroken for my family.
Our son and daughter-in-law's wedding was a fantastic event there. People still talk about it. We had a grand party of singing, dancing, and reverie on land along the Coosawattee.
I want to know who is responsible for this calamity happening. I want to know what kind of person or persons would deceive their neighbors, their community.
I admit that I'm angry. This is a travesty. It's shameful. Do the right thing. Clean up our community. You owe us that much!
Coleen Brooks is a longtime resident of Gordon County who previously wrote for the Calhoun Times as a columnist.
She retired as the director and lead instructor for the Georgia Northwestern
Technical College Adult Education Department in 2013. She can be reached
at coleenbrooks1947@gmail.com.