Posted on July 10, 2018
Dan Stephany, director of public works, said research and engineering for the dredging of the Winnequah Park north lagoon will wrap up this year, and he expects the Monona City Council to approve the actual sediment removal for next year.
“PCBs were discovered in the lagoon in 2015, and we’re hoping to complete (the removal) next year,” he said. “This is the third year of researching and engineering.” Working with the state Department of Natural Resources throughout the process, the city has received a trio of grants totaling $25,000 to help pay for the planning costs for the project. There was a city cost-share component to accepting the grant money, Stephany said.
Stephany said the sediment removal costs will be part of his proposed capital budget for next year. Alders debate and approve a capital projects budget in the fall. In 2015, sediment removal boxes were installed in the area, and contaminated soil was discovered near the swimming pool and tennis court cement area, the site of a landfill in the 1940s. PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, are industrial products or chemicals. These chemicals were banned in the United States in 1979 due to potentially having negative impacts on human and environmental health.
For 50 years prior to the ban, the chemicals were used in such as coolants and lubricants in transformers, electrical insulators, capacitors and electric appliances such as television sets or refrigerators. Wastes from the manufacturing process that contained PCBs were often placed in dump sites or landfills.
PAHs, or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, are found in coal and tar deposits, and are also produced by the incomplete combustion of organic matter.
In the spring, the city’s public works committee had also discussed revisiting the dredging of the Yahara River surrounding Pirate Island.
“The previous mayor removed this from the budget twice, because he wanted more buy-in from the residents, particularly a single property owner who owns much of the land there,” Stephany said.
Robert Kau of K & K Management owns most of the properties on the interior of the island, as well as a property on the exterior on Bartels Street. A city ordinance requires property owners to pay 70 percent of the dredging costs, based on how many linear feet of their property is on the waterway.
A phone call to K & K Management seeking comment was not returned.
Stepahny said preliminary engineering costs for the dredging would be included in his capital budget request for 2019. That would be followed by final engineering costs in 2020 and the actual dredging in 2021. Like all fiscal decisions, the mayor and city council will make the final determination.
Source: The Herald-Independent
