THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, March 20, 1996 TAG: 9603200481
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY SCOTT HARPER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 105 lines
Tidewater Community College and Suffolk City Hall have concluded a deal that should quell long-standing fears that drinking water at TCC's Suffolk campus may be contaminated by buried munitions and other toxic materials.
By this fall, an estimated 10 million gallons of treated city water will be piped each day to the college. Its antiquated well-water system will be retired, school and city officials said this week.
``It's going to happen, and it's going to happen pretty soon,'' said Albert Moor, Suffolk's utilities director.
Oddly enough, hardly anyone knows about the $250,000 pipeline project, which could be under construction within weeks, officials said.
Students have not been told. And news of the deal came as a surprise to federal and state environmental investigators, who continue to spend thousands of dollars studying possible groundwater contamination and other hazards at the site overlooking the James and Nansemond rivers.
``I seriously did not know this was going to happen,'' Carolyn Szumal, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, said Tuesday. The EPA has been scrutinizing the campus and surrounding property as a candidate for a special hazardous-waste cleanup.
Because the property was formerly a military depot, processing millions of tons of munitions during World Wars I and II, including chemical weapons, the Army Corps of Engineers has been the lead agency in determining any lingering problems.
Corps officials said Tuesday that while they knew TCC and Suffolk were discussing a public waterline, they did not know a deal had been struck.
While the line should end any future problems with drinking water at TCC, federal and state investigators still want answers to numerous questions raised in a just-released corps report on underground contamination.
The report, based on sampling in 1994 and 1995, found for the first time that traces of the explosive TNT have tainted the Yorktown Aquifer, an underground reservoir tapped for drinking water by the college and other private well owners.
``Until now, we had no knowledge that the Yorktown was in danger,'' said Devlin Harris, an administrator and chemical expert with the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality. ``This is a large source of potable water, so obviously we need to find out more about the extent of its contamination.''
The report also found that monitoring wells around the campus continue to show minimal, if any, traces of TNT and lead in them, and that none of the school's four water wells is contaminated by such toxic materials.
The report, however, notes how TNT residues are moving slowly underground toward the four wells and are about 650 feet away from the closest one.
Al Cecchini, facilities director for TCC in Suffolk, said the school's pursuit of a public waterline began in 1985, when an internal study suggested that the campus connect to Suffolk or Portsmouth's utility system.
The college has asked the Virginia General Assembly for project money three times since 1989 and was awarded $257,000 for pipeline construction in the current 1994-1996 state budget, Cecchini said.
``I hardly see how this can be a secret to anyone,'' he said.
Asked why students have not been informed of the new line, Cecchini said sensitive details remained unsettled until recently. Students have consistently questioned the safety of campus water, especially after the administration bought bottled water and installed water filters in 1994.
``We're probably ready to go forward with some public announcements,'' Cecchini said Tuesday.
Ever since a 13-year-old boy discovered active TNT on a campus soccer field in 1987, spurring the removal of tons of tainted soil and buried munitions, the college has tried to minimize publicity over its military past.
The school also sits in a fast-developing region of South Hampton Roads, with several industrial and residential projects planned in the Interstate 664 corridor between Suffolk and Portsmouth.
Quiet diplomacy has been the preferred method for handling such prickly news items as buried munitions, chemical weaponry and federal investigations of groundwater contamination.
Development is a key reason why the college can connect to Suffolk's water system. For years, Suffolk officials told the college that they lacked money to extend a line to the campus. But with a developer paying for much of that extension, the time is right for the college to finally hook up, Cecchini explained.
The tap will be located near the school's entrance, and the line will run along the southside of College Drive toward the main campus, Cecchini said.
While TCC will get most of the 10 million gallons of treated water a day, General Electric also will receive a share. GE owns a small tract of land just west of campus, and is leasing much of its property to the Navy for a war-games simulation complex. ILLUSTRATION: Map
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by CNB