| Milltown Dam removal plan finalized By SHERRY DEVLIN of the Missoulian Twenty-three years after a Missoula County sanitarian found arsenic in Milltown's tap water, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Monday issued a final plan for excavating the sediments that brought the poison to town and taking Milltown Dam out of the river so it doesn't happen again. " A lot of people thought this would never happen in their lifetimes," said Chuck Erickson, president of Friends of Two Rivers, a group of Milltown and Bonner residents who lobbied for removal of the dam and millions of cubic yards of tainted reservoir sediments. " It's been such a long road to get here," said Peter Nielsen, an environmental health supervisor at the Missoula City-County Health Department. "But it's final now. It is going to happen." Work at Milltown Reservoir will begin this winter, with removal of the dam as early as January 2006. Then will come the excavation of 2.6 million cubic yards of contaminated reservoir sediments, a two-year job. Within seven years, the cleanup will be complete and the free-flowing confluence of the Clark Fork and Blackfoot rivers - blocked by Milltown Dam since 1908 - will be restored. " Everyone is anxious to get started," said Russ Forba, the EPA's Milltown project manager. "We'll move as quickly as we can. It's in everyone's best interest - and in the river's best interest - to get this done." The EPA's formal record of decision calls for removal of the most contaminated reservoir sediments - the source of the arsenic that pollutes Milltown's aquifer - and disposal of those sediments in tailings ponds 100 miles upstream in Opportunity. Monday's announcement was not a surprise; the agency proposed the plan last May. But it did represent a dramatic shift in the agency's thinking over the past decade. " It's been a long journey," said John Wardell, director of the EPA's Montana field office. "This is an exciting, and I think the best, decision. It offers all sorts of opportunities for people in Milltown and Missoula, and in western Montana." The EPA was ready to release a cleanup plan that left the dam and sediments in place when, in January 1996, an ice jam broke loose on the Blackfoot River and sent an enormous flow of ice and debris toward Milltown Reservoir. Worried dam operators opened the floodgates, saving the dam but sending a huge plug of highly polluted, ice-scoured reservoir sediments downstream. By summer, there were no fish in the Clark Fork River immediately downstream from the dam. And Missoula residents were calling for the dam's removal as part of the Superfund cleanup process. " It took a long time actually to decide that we really needed to look at removing the dam - that it offered an opportunity to accomplish several things, that it was important," Wardell said Monday. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, also brought to attention by the ice jam, played a role by reclassifying Milltown as a high-hazard dam. So did the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which targeted Milltown Dam as an impediment to the recovery of bull trout, a federally protected species. Then, four years ago, came an all-out push by Missoula County and the Clark Fork Coalition intended to convince local citizens (and then state and federal officials) of the benefits of dam removal. " When we started talking about this idea, people thought it was nuts," said Tracy Stone-Manning, executive director of the Clark Fork Coalition, a river watchdog group. "It just goes to show that when citizens speak with one voice, really great things can happen." When the EPA released a revised proposed cleanup plan last May, just 2 percent of the 800 people who commented were opposed to removal of the dam and sediments. " That's impressive," said Missoula County Commissioner Barbara Evans. Still, Evans said, it is important to remember that some people in Milltown and Bonner are unhappy about the plan and the way it will change their community. Their landscape will change, and rather dramatically. " There has been a small group of folks who did not want this to occur," she said Monday. "I would encourage them to work with us now - to get involved." Next month, a citizen working group will release a proposal for the redevelopment of the reservoir site, Evans said. "So it's important that everyone gets their two bits in as we move ahead." Leading the opposition has been the Bonner Development Group, headed by Piltzville resident Bruce Hall. He did not return phone calls to the Missoulian on Monday. Before any construction occurs, however, the EPA has another critical piece of work to complete - the negotiation and signing of a consent decree assigning responsibility for the cleanup to the companies responsible for the pollution. Forba said he expects a consent decree by late January. " We are very hopeful," he said. "Things are going very well. As you can imagine, though, it is very, very arduous." Atlantic Richfield Co. must pay for the bulk of the estimated $100 million cleanup because of its merger with Anaconda Copper Co. - which dumped mine and smelter tailings along and in the Clark Fork River upstream of Milltown for nearly a century. As owner of the dam that created the barrier to the tailings' downstream migration, NorthWestern Energy also must pay for some of the costs - estimated at $11 million. Terms of the consent decree and details of the negotiations are closely guarded, and will not be released until the document is signed by all parties. Robin Bullock, Arco's Montana manager, did not return phone calls to the Missoulian on Monday. However, NorthWestern spokeswoman Claudia Rapkoch said her company is "very happy" with the cleanup plan. " It's something that we've been promoting," she said. "We are pleased and hope the consent decree will come along soon." She could not, however, comment on the negotiations - which have gone on for nearly three years. In the meantime, Forba said he will work on designing the cleanup - which Arco intends to contract out to Missoula-based Envirocon. If all goes as planned, Forba said the reservoir will be drawn down by 10 feet before high water this spring. Then will come construction of a bypass channel that will take the Clark Fork around the most contaminated sediments during the dam's removal. The bypass, which will be built to hold a 100-year flood, will help to limit the amount of sediment sent downriver by the cleanup. Nielsen said Missoula County will continue to work closely with the EPA throughout construction, both to minimize the short-term environmental impacts and to ensure that the area is fully restored and redeveloped in the best interest of local citizens. " We have a lot of hard work ahead of us," he said. "We want to create a long-term asset for our community." " I am tickled," said U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. and a proponent of dam removal. "A lot of people thought it couldn't be done." Baucus said he will work to find redevelopment money through the federal highway bill. Congratulations, he said, should go to all involved: Arco, NorthWestern, the EPA and state of Montana, Missoula County and its citizenry. " What a beautiful gift to the people of Montana and the Clark Fork River," said Stone-Manning. "Great things can result from this, both ecologically and from an economic development standpoint. We are about to get this incredible asset - the confluence of two really fine rivers. " It's a victory well beyond what it means for the river." |