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Okay
So apparently there's some kind of matter
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
You know transmission line goes down or something but they are crack engineers so they'll have it back up very shortly
Sorry, I have no idea. What is the length of this segment tonight? It's like pretty short for us. It's about five
Okay
Just didn't want to draw on too long with certain issues. Oh, I'll cut you off
Yeah kidding
I have my lengthy answers and I have my shorter answers
Yeah, this is like oddly somewhere in between, right?
Yeah, yep, yep
So
How long have I been chair?
Since
A year ago. Yeah, April of last year
And were you on the town board before that?
No, I've been the town board chair this last year and
I have been the fire chief out here for about 20. I've been on the fire about 23 years
I was the assistant chief for 20 years and I've been the fire chief for three years. Wow
And so my background is as an environmental health specialist. Perfect. I was
Yeah, I was a commissioned officer with the U.S. Public Health Service
So I was active duty and served in the public health service and so
My background I've been dealing with PFAS and stuff like that for probably the last 10 years
Wow
And so when our community started having issues
You know, I kind of stepped up and started asking a lot of very pointed questions
And that's kind of what led me to become town board chair
Was, you know, people wanted someone that, you know, could help them with the answers, you know
Or at least try to get the answers. That is really interesting
I never knew that and that is so important and how lucky
How lucky for the community to have you with that experience and background
And I worked for the government for, like I said, I worked for the government for
the two feet thing just came on again
I worked for government for 34 years in service
I was five years in the army and then I was 28 years with the public health service
So I retired in 2022 with 34 years of military service
Wow
Yeah
Nice pension
Yeah, don't all right, it pays the bills and keeps me busy
Yeah
I retired and seemed like I got more busy, busier
Well, yeah, it sounds like it
I think our engineers worked that through
Got it, perfect
Now that 125 million state dollars are coming to the rescue for communities
Across Wisconsin poison by the forever chemicals PFAS
The question is when will the money come and how much will go where?
Those questions are front of mind in the town of Stella population about 650
With some of the highest concentrations of PFAS in the country
Town chair William Casey Crump is here and thanks very much for being here
Thank you for having me
So what was your reaction when you learned the funds would finally be released
It was a relief to be honest
It's been two years or three years roughly I think since those funds were originally talked about
And to have the Senate and the governor finally come to an agreement
And get that stuff signed off on and get it out is the first of many steps yet to come I think
Yeah, because what do you know about how much Stella will receive?
That's the great unknown
I've talked to DNR yesterday as a matter of fact
And we're going to they're still trying to figure out exactly who's going to control the money
How it's going to be distributed
They're not even sure themselves exactly, you know
Whether it's going to be municipalities like Stella that end up getting some of the money
Or our residents I should say not necessarily municipality
Or it's going to be public water works that get the money
We've got was on we've got Tomahawk and some and Rhineland or even that have well issues
For their towns whereas out here in Starks we're individual wells
And so each homeowner is responsible for that
And so it's very important hopefully that there will be some of that money
It will go directly to those residents
Because would that be priority one for the funds in Stella private wells?
I would love to see it become priority one either that or treatment systems
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
The problem is when those re drills were done they still had PFOS in their water
Which made their water undrinkable
Some of them came up still had PFOS but it was below the level
So the secondary secondary treatment on that is to put in a water treatment system in your home
It's we don't want or I feel like we don't want a kitchen faucet treatment
We want a whole house treatment system because if you're only getting your drinking water from your kitchen sink
It's very hard to brush teeth. It's very hard to you know take showers
It makes it much more difficult so that's why a whole house system would be important
And those are expensive so again money for that would be a blessing
Why not jump right to the whole house system instead of going through drilling new wells or deeper wells?
Well I think that if they can get clean water and they can get a well that works
That's a much longer term solution and also it's not going to be any more of a great cost on the residents
The whole home treatments require filters
Those filters run 300 to 500 dollars
They recommend you change those quarterly there's two filters
So that's a thousand dollars each time they have to change the filter
So that's roughly four thousand a year
That's very very rough on our families out here
We're not a rich community
We're not vacation homes
We're farmers
We're ranchers
We're small
We're blue collar people
So we've reported on this but what is the known source of the PFOS in your community?
Well it's definitely there is a lot of information that points to the paper mills
The sludge from the paper mills and I'm not sure if you know how that works
I won't go into great detail on that
But when they wash the paper all of that water gets collected
All the stuff that comes off the paper gets collected
And it was looked at back in the 60s and 70s as a very very high nutrient rich fertilizer
So they spread it on the fields out here for years and years and years
The property that I own, they spread it clear back into mid 70s I think
Up until probably the time we bought the land
And so paper mill has been a big part of that
And the paper mill here made microwave popcorn bags
Those bags are lined with PFOS to keep them from leaking
To keep the butter and the oil inside it from leaking out
And that's where the majority of the PFOS came from when they were treating those microwave popcorn bags
That's what we've been told
That's what the history shows
And that of course is what the DNR pointed to in their announcement of a linked source
And so what do you know about the linked source having some responsibility toward remediation and helping the community?
Sure, sure
And you know we're not the town itself is not involved in a lawsuit or anything like that
Some of our individual residents are involved in that lawsuit
But the paper mill aldstrom who is like the third owner I think since I've lived here in the last 20 years
They have stepped forward and they are providing some drinking water to families that have concerns
The problem with that is it's not a solution
It's just I mean they're only going to provide the water and they're going to reevaluate in January of 2027
So people may just turn around and lose that water if they just stop
And so my take on that is they should be using that water to test people's wells who want to be tested
And then help them out if there are high PFOS help them out with getting the treatment system
Or help them out with paperwork to get the DNR to provide some funds for well drilling or something like that
The money they spend on the drinking water is going to anybody that wants drinking water
They don't even have to have their well tested
And so obviously there's some room for individuals to get water that may not necessarily need it
So again they're trying I think it's a first step a very basic first step
I have requested to sit down with them I put that request in over a month and a half ago
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
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
And we've heard nothing
Well we will keep watching the situation there and we appreciate your time
You betcha thank you
For more on this and other issues facing Wisconsin
Visit our website at pbswisconsin.org and then click on the news tab
That's our program for tonight I'm Frederica Freiberg
Have a good weekend
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