LONDONDERRY — With 57 homes still without safe water due to contamination from a local Superfund site, residents are seeking help from the town.
Administrative Support Coordinator Kirsten Hildonen said at the Dec. 3 Utilities Committee meeting that a decades-long town water project should be giving residents some answers to the problem by the end of January.
The town is sending a letter to the EPA and the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services about the Tinkham Garage Superfund site and the houses whose wells were affected by it, Hildonen said.
The Town Council requested the letter be drafted after a group of residents from the affected neighborhood came to the Dec. 2 Town Council meeting, led by Maureen Mansfield.
Mansfield, who has lived at 10 Ross Drive for 24 years, said approximately 57 homes on Ross Drive and Tokanel Drive still do not have access to clean drinking water.
“It’s been 24 years,” Mansfield said. “You put all these new houses in, and townhouses, and condos and they’re all getting hooked up to town water. Most of us have been there for years, and nothing’s happening.”
Hildonen said she and Director of Engineering John Trottier spoke with Cheryl Sprague at the EPA and Rene Nahlik, the Tinkham Garage Superfund site project manager, on Wednesday about when the town might hear about remedies for the affected residents.
“Rene did tell us the state is supportive of advancing the remedy they’re working on, with the waterline as an interim-type solution,” Hildonen said. “There’s obviously more work to be done beyond just that.”
The 375-acre Tinkham Garage site has been an ongoing problem since 1978, when residents on Ross Drive initially reported there was a bad odor and unusual foam on a small river that supplied water to residential wells.
Through investigations in 1978 and 1979, the EPA found that oil, oily wastes, washing from septic tank trucks and releases of other hazardous substances were being dumped into the fields south and east of Tinkham Garage.
The Superfund was created when groundwater testing in 1981 at the Tinkham Garage site showed harmful chemicals, according to EPA documents. A year later, the EPA found there were volatile organic compounds in surface and groundwater in the land adjacent to the site. In 1983, a waterline was installed to provide water to the 400 residents who live southwest of the site.
Mansfield said she has put in between $20,000 and $30,000 worth of filtration systems so she and her family can have access to clean water. She said that recently, four additional houses in her neighborhood have been added to lists to receive bottled water because the water is too unsafe to drink.
Hildonen said one of the reasons it has been taking so long is because it’s unclear who is paying for the damages done.
In the meantime, Hildonen said the town will continue to urge the EPA to focus on the Tinkham Garage site.
“We worked with legal to send a letter to the EPA and New Hampshire DES, urging them to do everything they can to prioritize and move this forward as quickly as possible,” Hildonen said.
In September, the EPA released a document called the Tinkham Garage Community Action Plan, where it listed the ways it plans on being in contact with the communities, including outreach via social media, a website with more information, and contacting local newspapers.
The EPA sent a letter to residents in June saying they planned on holding a public information session at the end of 2024 to address the residents’ concerns. Hildonen said during her conversation with Sprague and Nahlik that the EPA is looking at moving those sessions to the end of January.
While the wait is long, Hildonen said the town is sympathetic to the residents and hopes they can work with NHDES and the EPA to bring forward solutions.
“I know that sometimes the answer that’s the most honest truth is not the answer people want to hear at the moment and I am deeply empathetic to that,” Hildonen said. “These folks need and want water and they deserve the water and it’s something the EPA and DES are actively working towards.”