Toxins should be clear of river
1/27/2013Our community should not allow human waste byproducts and other toxins to be processed on the banks of the Maumee River, one of the major tributaries of the largest source of fresh water in the world (“EPA asked to examine sludge use; Kaptur questions impact on lake, bay,” Jan. 24).
Last year, Toledo Mayor Mike Bell’s administration and city council, after much debate, awarded a sole contract to S&L Fertilizer to process sewage sludge, trucked from the city’s water reclamation plant in North Toledo to East Toledo, to be stored on the banks of the Maumee River and turned into a product called Nu-Soil.
Council members D. Michael Collins, Lindsay Webb, and I voted against this contract. Now, U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) has called on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to look into the peculiar placement of this sewage sludge on the banks of the Maumee. And rightly so.
The debate could be solved if the Bell administration would amend the contract with S&L to require that the storage be moved to a safer location far away from the banks of the Maumee River.
Only this initiative will give our residents peace of mind that their drinking water and freshwater sporting areas are not in danger of contamination.
ROB LUDEMAN
Toledo City Council
Glen Ellyn Drive
Whitmer letter off base on fine
If Patrick Hickey, the superintendent of Washington Local Schools, doesn’t want the school district’s $50,000 payment to the Ohio High School Athletic Association to be called a fine, what would he like us to call it (“Don’t call Whitmer settlement a fine,” Readers’ Forum, Dec. 30)?
Would he prefer to call it a bill to be paid by district taxpayers? How about a penalty for the students who may see school services cut?
He should take a pay cut for the way he allowed Whitmer High School, Washington Local, and residents of Toledo to be embarrassed by this debacle.
JASON MILLER
Ann Drive