1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,000 You 2 00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:32,000 You 3 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:02,000 You 4 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:32,000 You 5 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:02,000 Okay 6 00:02:25,000 --> 00:02:29,000 So apparently there's some kind of matter 7 00:02:29,000 --> 00:02:41,000 Having to do with a record deck or something like that and I'm sure that our engineers are running around like how they do when 8 00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:52,000 You know transmission line goes down or something but they are crack engineers so they'll have it back up very shortly 9 00:02:52,000 --> 00:03:00,000 Sorry, I have no idea. What is the length of this segment tonight? It's like pretty short for us. It's about five 10 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:04,000 Okay 11 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:08,000 Just didn't want to draw on too long with certain issues. Oh, I'll cut you off 12 00:03:08,000 --> 00:03:11,000 Yeah kidding 13 00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:15,000 I have my lengthy answers and I have my shorter answers 14 00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:20,000 Yeah, this is like oddly somewhere in between, right? 15 00:03:20,000 --> 00:03:24,000 Yeah, yep, yep 16 00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:28,000 So 17 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:32,000 How long have I been chair? 18 00:03:32,000 --> 00:03:36,000 Since 19 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:42,000 A year ago. Yeah, April of last year 20 00:03:42,000 --> 00:03:46,000 And were you on the town board before that? 21 00:03:46,000 --> 00:03:52,000 No, I've been the town board chair this last year and 22 00:03:52,000 --> 00:03:58,000 I have been the fire chief out here for about 20. I've been on the fire about 23 years 23 00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:02,000 I was the assistant chief for 20 years and I've been the fire chief for three years. Wow 24 00:04:02,000 --> 00:04:08,000 And so my background is as an environmental health specialist. Perfect. I was 25 00:04:08,000 --> 00:04:11,000 Yeah, I was a commissioned officer with the U.S. Public Health Service 26 00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:17,000 So I was active duty and served in the public health service and so 27 00:04:17,000 --> 00:04:22,000 My background I've been dealing with PFAS and stuff like that for probably the last 10 years 28 00:04:22,000 --> 00:04:23,000 Wow 29 00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:25,000 And so when our community started having issues 30 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:30,000 You know, I kind of stepped up and started asking a lot of very pointed questions 31 00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:34,000 And that's kind of what led me to become town board chair 32 00:04:34,000 --> 00:04:41,000 Was, you know, people wanted someone that, you know, could help them with the answers, you know 33 00:04:41,000 --> 00:04:44,000 Or at least try to get the answers. That is really interesting 34 00:04:44,000 --> 00:04:49,000 I never knew that and that is so important and how lucky 35 00:04:49,000 --> 00:04:56,000 How lucky for the community to have you with that experience and background 36 00:04:56,000 --> 00:05:00,000 And I worked for the government for, like I said, I worked for the government for 37 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:02,000 the two feet thing just came on again 38 00:05:02,000 --> 00:05:05,000 I worked for government for 34 years in service 39 00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:09,000 I was five years in the army and then I was 28 years with the public health service 40 00:05:09,000 --> 00:05:15,000 So I retired in 2022 with 34 years of military service 41 00:05:15,000 --> 00:05:16,000 Wow 42 00:05:16,000 --> 00:05:17,000 Yeah 43 00:05:17,000 --> 00:05:19,000 Nice pension 44 00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:24,000 Yeah, don't all right, it pays the bills and keeps me busy 45 00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:25,000 Yeah 46 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:29,000 I retired and seemed like I got more busy, busier 47 00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:31,000 Well, yeah, it sounds like it 48 00:05:31,000 --> 00:05:34,000 I think our engineers worked that through 49 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:36,000 Got it, perfect 50 00:05:51,000 --> 00:05:56,000 Now that 125 million state dollars are coming to the rescue for communities 51 00:05:56,000 --> 00:06:00,000 Across Wisconsin poison by the forever chemicals PFAS 52 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:04,000 The question is when will the money come and how much will go where? 53 00:06:04,000 --> 00:06:09,000 Those questions are front of mind in the town of Stella population about 650 54 00:06:09,000 --> 00:06:14,000 With some of the highest concentrations of PFAS in the country 55 00:06:14,000 --> 00:06:18,000 Town chair William Casey Crump is here and thanks very much for being here 56 00:06:18,000 --> 00:06:20,000 Thank you for having me 57 00:06:20,000 --> 00:06:25,000 So what was your reaction when you learned the funds would finally be released 58 00:06:26,000 --> 00:06:29,000 It was a relief to be honest 59 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:35,000 It's been two years or three years roughly I think since those funds were originally talked about 60 00:06:35,000 --> 00:06:39,000 And to have the Senate and the governor finally come to an agreement 61 00:06:39,000 --> 00:06:45,000 And get that stuff signed off on and get it out is the first of many steps yet to come I think 62 00:06:45,000 --> 00:06:49,000 Yeah, because what do you know about how much Stella will receive? 63 00:06:49,000 --> 00:06:51,000 That's the great unknown 64 00:06:52,000 --> 00:06:55,000 I've talked to DNR yesterday as a matter of fact 65 00:06:55,000 --> 00:07:00,000 And we're going to they're still trying to figure out exactly who's going to control the money 66 00:07:00,000 --> 00:07:02,000 How it's going to be distributed 67 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:05,000 They're not even sure themselves exactly, you know 68 00:07:05,000 --> 00:07:10,000 Whether it's going to be municipalities like Stella that end up getting some of the money 69 00:07:10,000 --> 00:07:14,000 Or our residents I should say not necessarily municipality 70 00:07:14,000 --> 00:07:17,000 Or it's going to be public water works that get the money 71 00:07:18,000 --> 00:07:23,000 We've got was on we've got Tomahawk and some and Rhineland or even that have well issues 72 00:07:23,000 --> 00:07:27,000 For their towns whereas out here in Starks we're individual wells 73 00:07:27,000 --> 00:07:30,000 And so each homeowner is responsible for that 74 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:34,000 And so it's very important hopefully that there will be some of that money 75 00:07:34,000 --> 00:07:36,000 It will go directly to those residents 76 00:07:36,000 --> 00:07:40,000 Because would that be priority one for the funds in Stella private wells? 77 00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:44,000 I would love to see it become priority one either that or treatment systems 78 00:07:44,000 --> 00:07:51,000 The way it is right now is the DNR did have some funds that they made available for people to have their wells re-drilled 79 00:07:51,000 --> 00:07:55,000 The problem is when those re drills were done they still had PFOS in their water 80 00:07:55,000 --> 00:07:57,000 Which made their water undrinkable 81 00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:01,000 Some of them came up still had PFOS but it was below the level 82 00:08:01,000 --> 00:08:07,000 So the secondary secondary treatment on that is to put in a water treatment system in your home 83 00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:14,000 It's we don't want or I feel like we don't want a kitchen faucet treatment 84 00:08:14,000 --> 00:08:20,000 We want a whole house treatment system because if you're only getting your drinking water from your kitchen sink 85 00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:23,000 It's very hard to brush teeth. It's very hard to you know take showers 86 00:08:23,000 --> 00:08:27,000 It makes it much more difficult so that's why a whole house system would be important 87 00:08:27,000 --> 00:08:31,000 And those are expensive so again money for that would be a blessing 88 00:08:31,000 --> 00:08:39,000 Why not jump right to the whole house system instead of going through drilling new wells or deeper wells? 89 00:08:39,000 --> 00:08:44,000 Well I think that if they can get clean water and they can get a well that works 90 00:08:44,000 --> 00:08:53,000 That's a much longer term solution and also it's not going to be any more of a great cost on the residents 91 00:08:53,000 --> 00:08:56,000 The whole home treatments require filters 92 00:08:56,000 --> 00:08:58,000 Those filters run 300 to 500 dollars 93 00:08:58,000 --> 00:09:01,000 They recommend you change those quarterly there's two filters 94 00:09:01,000 --> 00:09:04,000 So that's a thousand dollars each time they have to change the filter 95 00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:06,000 So that's roughly four thousand a year 96 00:09:06,000 --> 00:09:09,000 That's very very rough on our families out here 97 00:09:09,000 --> 00:09:11,000 We're not a rich community 98 00:09:11,000 --> 00:09:13,000 We're not vacation homes 99 00:09:13,000 --> 00:09:14,000 We're farmers 100 00:09:14,000 --> 00:09:15,000 We're ranchers 101 00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:16,000 We're small 102 00:09:16,000 --> 00:09:18,000 We're blue collar people 103 00:09:18,000 --> 00:09:23,000 So we've reported on this but what is the known source of the PFOS in your community? 104 00:09:24,000 --> 00:09:30,000 Well it's definitely there is a lot of information that points to the paper mills 105 00:09:30,000 --> 00:09:34,000 The sludge from the paper mills and I'm not sure if you know how that works 106 00:09:34,000 --> 00:09:36,000 I won't go into great detail on that 107 00:09:36,000 --> 00:09:39,000 But when they wash the paper all of that water gets collected 108 00:09:39,000 --> 00:09:41,000 All the stuff that comes off the paper gets collected 109 00:09:41,000 --> 00:09:47,000 And it was looked at back in the 60s and 70s as a very very high nutrient rich fertilizer 110 00:09:47,000 --> 00:09:51,000 So they spread it on the fields out here for years and years and years 111 00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:55,000 The property that I own, they spread it clear back into mid 70s I think 112 00:09:55,000 --> 00:09:58,000 Up until probably the time we bought the land 113 00:09:58,000 --> 00:10:02,000 And so paper mill has been a big part of that 114 00:10:02,000 --> 00:10:05,000 And the paper mill here made microwave popcorn bags 115 00:10:05,000 --> 00:10:09,000 Those bags are lined with PFOS to keep them from leaking 116 00:10:09,000 --> 00:10:12,000 To keep the butter and the oil inside it from leaking out 117 00:10:12,000 --> 00:10:16,000 And that's where the majority of the PFOS came from when they were treating those microwave popcorn bags 118 00:10:16,000 --> 00:10:18,000 That's what we've been told 119 00:10:18,000 --> 00:10:20,000 That's what the history shows 120 00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:26,000 And that of course is what the DNR pointed to in their announcement of a linked source 121 00:10:26,000 --> 00:10:37,000 And so what do you know about the linked source having some responsibility toward remediation and helping the community? 122 00:10:37,000 --> 00:10:39,000 Sure, sure 123 00:10:39,000 --> 00:10:43,000 And you know we're not the town itself is not involved in a lawsuit or anything like that 124 00:10:43,000 --> 00:10:46,000 Some of our individual residents are involved in that lawsuit 125 00:10:46,000 --> 00:10:53,000 But the paper mill aldstrom who is like the third owner I think since I've lived here in the last 20 years 126 00:10:53,000 --> 00:10:58,000 They have stepped forward and they are providing some drinking water to families that have concerns 127 00:10:58,000 --> 00:11:01,000 The problem with that is it's not a solution 128 00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:07,000 It's just I mean they're only going to provide the water and they're going to reevaluate in January of 2027 129 00:11:07,000 --> 00:11:10,000 So people may just turn around and lose that water if they just stop 130 00:11:11,000 --> 00:11:18,000 And so my take on that is they should be using that water to test people's wells who want to be tested 131 00:11:18,000 --> 00:11:23,000 And then help them out if there are high PFOS help them out with getting the treatment system 132 00:11:23,000 --> 00:11:30,000 Or help them out with paperwork to get the DNR to provide some funds for well drilling or something like that 133 00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:34,000 The money they spend on the drinking water is going to anybody that wants drinking water 134 00:11:34,000 --> 00:11:36,000 They don't even have to have their well tested 135 00:11:37,000 --> 00:11:44,000 And so obviously there's some room for individuals to get water that may not necessarily need it 136 00:11:44,000 --> 00:11:49,000 So again they're trying I think it's a first step a very basic first step 137 00:11:49,000 --> 00:11:54,000 I have requested to sit down with them I put that request in over a month and a half ago 138 00:11:54,000 --> 00:12:02,000 And I got a call back two three weeks ago saying they were still trying to determine how and if and when they wanted to meet with us 139 00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:10,000 So we're getting the spend there it feels like to me because it's been more than a month since I made that request to them 140 00:12:10,000 --> 00:12:12,000 And we've heard nothing 141 00:12:12,000 --> 00:12:17,000 Well we will keep watching the situation there and we appreciate your time 142 00:12:17,000 --> 00:12:19,000 You betcha thank you 143 00:12:19,000 --> 00:12:22,000 For more on this and other issues facing Wisconsin 144 00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:27,000 Visit our website at pbswisconsin.org and then click on the news tab 145 00:12:27,000 --> 00:12:30,000 That's our program for tonight I'm Frederica Freiberg 146 00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:32,000 Have a good weekend 147 00:12:57,000 --> 00:13:00,000 You 148 00:13:27,000 --> 00:13:30,000 You