Poorly stored or long-forgotten chemicals like the kinds found in mustard gas, radioactive materials, flammable oils and open containers of mercury lurk in Maine schools.
John Hinck is almost surprised nothing serious has happened yet.
“Some of these hazards are the proverbial ticking time bomb,” said the Natural Resources Council of Maine spokesman.
He and others drew attention Wednesday to a Bar Harbor lawmaker’s bill that would breathe new life into a program that rids schools here of unwanted toxics by adding a 30-cent tax to pesticides.
Inspections in 80 Maine schools from July 2002 to June 2004 turned up more than 700 pounds of mercury and a total of 6,500 pounds of toxic refuse.
A program that helped pay for hauling away the refuse has run out of money.
Hinck said 367 middle and high schools have yet to be checked.
Under state law, schools are supposed to take stock of everything hazardous every year, said Ann Pistell, an environmental specialist at the Department of Environment Protection. But until DEP started workshops on the issue, “a lot of schools didn’t know about it, hadn’t done it.”
Thirteen local schools were among those 80 that underwent training and received DEP funds.
In Lewiston’s case, Pistell said the city diverted $24,500 it owed for fines over landfill violations toward cleanup at the high school, middle school and Martell and Farwell elementary schools last summer.
Nearly 900 pounds and 277 gallons of chemically hazardous waste were cleaned out.
Some chemicals had sat on shelves for 10 years that should have been yanked after two, Lewiston High School science teacher Don King said.
“Some of (the chemicals) are relatively harmless but there shouldn’t be more than a two-year supply,” so they disposed of extra, King added. “Unless you know that you have a need for a substance, get rid of it. Why risk having the thing?”
Money also went to an acid cabinet and safety glasses.
Throughout the state, toxic hazards have been found in nurses’ stations, janitors’ closets, science labs, art classrooms and maintenance shops.
“I can’t tell you how many gallons of duplicating fluid we took out of front offices, and we don’t even use duplicating machines anymore,” Pistell said. Duplicating machines made copies while the user turned a wheel; the liquid is flammable.
Hinck said a proposed fee – 30 cents tacked onto the purchase of home and garden pesticides – could pay for finishing the job of cleaning out remaining schools over the next four years.
In the former program, DEP paid for mercury removal and the cost of a visit from a professional service; school systems footed the bill to remove other chemicals.
He would like to see enough money raised to pay for that as well, Hinck said. In some schools, after seeing the total cost, “the drain probably looks too tempting.”
Local high schools that used the DEP funds for cleanups are: Lisbon, Mountain Valley in Rumford, Telstar in Bethel, Oak Hill in Wales and Leavitt in Turner. Others are Tripp Middle School in Turner, Monmouth Academy, Oxford Hills Middle School in Paris and Rangeley Lakes Regional School.
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