Brownsburg shop owners concerned over discovery of contaminants

BROWNSBURG, Ind. (WISH) – Emails sent between a state project manager and an environmental contractor detailed an “urgent situation.”

The project manager for the Indiana Department of Environmental Management wrote in a Jan. 7 email: “there is an urgent situation at the Wyliepalooza Ice Cream shop… please take action within 30 days to lower the contaminant levels…”

The environmental contractor replied back the following day, stating that he understood “the urgency of the matter.”

But more than a month after those emails were exchanged, managers and owners of several shops at a Brownsburg strip mall tell I-Team 8 they were unaware that high levels of a contaminant known as trichloroethylene – or TCE – had been detected in the air of at least two of the businesses.

Several studies, including those reviewed by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Centers for Disease Control, show that there is a connection between exposure to TCE and certain types of cancer.

TCE is a common chemical used in cleaning metals and is often used in dry cleaning. While TCE is common in lots of cleaning items, the EPA and OSHA set standards warning employees who might subjected to long periods of exposure.

Wyliepalooza Ice Cream shop sits right next to current a dry cleaning business that up until last month, had been using a stain remover that contained TCE, according to Barry Sneed, a spokesman for IDEM.

Tests conducted this fall showed that air contamination levels of TCE in the ice cream shop were ten times higher than the level that would normally prompt an environmental response by the state.

The levels inside Brownsburg Cleaners were more than 20 times higher than that same standard.**

Brownsburg Cleaner’s new owner, who did not provide his name, confirmed to I-Team 8 that the business recently changed ownership and no longer uses the stain remover in question.

“Finding the TCE inside the ice cream parlor was a surprise,” said Bruce Palin, who is the Assistant Commissioner in IDEM’s Office of Land Quality.

Palin said that floor drains have been sealed and a vacuum was installed underneath the strip mall’s concrete slab in an effort to mitigate the spread of any TCE vapors.

Preliminary air samples gathered this week, Sneed said, showed levels of both TCE and PCE were within the state’s guidelines.

However, the source of the contaminants remains under investigation until more conclusive lab results are returned, Sneed said.

While recent “quick-grab tests” have showed levels of TCE and PCE were within state guidelines, business owners still expressed disappointment with not being kept abreast of the test results.

“I’m kind of disappointed that we weren’t notified of that. I think someone has a fiduciary responsibility to notify us of those kind of air contamination levels,” said Mark Timmons, who owns the Wyliepalooza ice cream shop located with the Brownsburg shopping plaza off Main Street.

Timmons said he has some knowledge of environmental contaminants as president of U.S. Water Systems, a commercial water treatment company.

“I haven’t researched the air levels… but I do know that high levels can be dangerous,” Timmons said in a phone interview with I-Team 8 while on business in Florida.

Attorney Brent Huber – who respresents Tom Lee, the strip mall’s property owner – said that if business owners were unaware of the air sampling results, it’s because they failed to ask to see them. Huber said the business owners did sign an access agreement that would allow them to have direct knowledge of the testing. Huber declined to send a copy of that agreement to I-Team 8.

Test samples noted in a December 2015 report were inconclusive in part, the contractor noted, because it had rained the week before testing and many of the floor drains contained water.

But an I-Team 8 review of hundreds of pages of documents posted to IDEM’s website show the strip mall has been contaminated for years.

In 2011, IDEM issued citation to Don Iliff, the owner of the now-defunct Iliff Cleaners, which used to occupy the space currently used by Brownsburg Cleaners.

State records show, the strip mall property owner, Tom Lee, entered into a voluntary remediation program with the state in an effort to clean up PCE, TCE and other contaminants that were found in soil, groundwater and in the air below the building’s concrete slab.

When asked why the remediation effort has been going on for five years, Huber said: “The state’s response has been slower than we would have liked.”

Efforts to reach Iliff for comment were unsuccessful.**The September figures

An indoor air sample collected from the dry cleaner in September showed TCE levels at more than 2100 micrograms per cubic meter, or more than 20 times higher than state’s action level of 88 that would normally prompt an environmental response.

Two samples inside the ice cream shop 10 times higher than normal – both measured at 1000 micrograms per cubic meter, respectively.Who should know?

Bruce Palin with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management says health threats can vary and air quality standards are often set conservatively.

Since the standards are set conservatively, according to Palin, we asked why would the project manager call it an “urgent situation”?

“Because of the unknown. We’d rather err on the side of safety as well,” Palin said.

When pressed further if employees in these businesses should be concerned, Palin said: “It’s hard to say. Again, we don’t have a good science on at what level does it become a significant issue.”

When asked if the state should inform business owners of test results, he said: “That’s a good question as far as at what point does that need to be done.”

More conclusive lab results should be available within the next few weeks, Sneed and Palin said. Huber said he expects results as early as Monday.