Bally, PA Residents Get Fresh Water From Tap After Seven-Year Wait

September 24, 2010 - The low hum of a water pump fills the small well house off Wheeler Lane. To borough residents who have been waiting seven years to get a glass of water from their faucet, it may be a joyful sound.

Since 1,4-dioxane was found in the municipal water system in 2003, residents haven't been able to turn on the faucet to grab a cold drink. At that time, Sunbeam Products Inc., which had purchased the Bally Case and Cooler site that was blamed for the contamination, began trucking in water for 1,000 residents. Other uses for the water, such as showering, were deemed safe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Sunbeam will cease to truck in water starting Tuesday, Sept. 28.

To demonstrate the current water's safety, Mike Dietrich, a public works employee, drank a tall glass of the refreshment from the tap at the new well house. "Tastes great," he said Thursday morning.

Dietrich said while the well had been completed in August, the borough couldn't announce whether it was potable until the EPA finished weeks of testing.

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Concerns Raised Over MI Dioxane Cleanup

May 26, 2009- An effort to change the cleanup of contaminated groundwater has come under fire by local residents and government officials who’ve been keeping an eye on the issue for more than 20 years.

At Wednesday’s annual meeting of the Coalition for Action on Remediation of Dioxane, residents said that requested changes filed by Pall Life Sciences earlier this month with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality would allow higher amounts of the contaminant, 1,4-dioxane, in the groundwater. As a result, they said, the 1,4-dioxane, a presumed carcinogen, could flow northward and reach Ann Arbor’s primary drinking water supply at Barton Pond.

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