EAST PALESTINE, Ohio — The EPA announced it will begin preliminary soil testing for farms nearly six weeks after the toxic East Palestine train derailment. However, the Ohio Department of Agriculture continues to vow the crops planted in or around East Palestine are safe for consumption and is the same for the animals that live off the land.
According to the USDA, 40% of the acreage in Columbiana County is farmland. Farming is big part of East Palestine's economy and farmers say this derailment continues to put their livelihoods at risk.
Sharon McElroy and her husband own and operate McElroy Homestead Farm in East Palestine. It’s home to 65 cows and sheep and three miles away from the toxic train derailment.
“We want to make sure all of our pasture and everything is all healthy,” said McElroy.
Since the derailment, McElroy said there’s been a lack of consumer confidence in their meat products.
“We had some people that were questioning, we do sell our beef and we do sell our lambs,” McElroy added.
The McElroys went to the Ohio Department of Agriculture's roundtable Thursday. ODA director Brian Baldridge had one main message; he said Columbiana County is producing normal healthy food and will continue monitoring.
“To this date, we have seen nothing that concerns us as far as our food chain,” Baldridge said.
Starting Friday, the EPA is beginning soil testing farms in and around East Palestine. The EPA is looking specifically for soil with ash and soot left over from the train car fire to test for semi-volatile chemicals, despite multiple days of rain that followed. News 5 asked why it took six weeks since the train derailment to begin testing.
“The triage initially as far as this emergency was first making sure it was safe for humans, but now we want to look into different stages of that,” Baldridge said.
McElroy had her soil privately tested by cardinal labs. She said her results came back safe, but she wants more testing, especially for dioxins.
“The only thing is we need to send it to another testing lab to test for some other chemicals and we would also like get some different areas of the farm too because this was just in one location,” McElroy added.
Cardinal Labs Director John Pflugh told News 5 his lab does not have the equipment to test for dioxins, but so far his lab has orchestrated 100 private soil samplings and none of the findings have been of concern.
“Taking a sample is like taking a photograph. That’s how things exist at this moment, and if there is something in the soil or stand to reason it could migrate into the aquifer further testing down the road would probably be recommended,” Pflugh said.
McElory isn’t happy with Thursday's roundtable and said her confidence isn't fully restored.
“I wish there were more processes in place and I think it took them a little bit too long to finally get together and have a roundtable and start pushing these questions,” McElroy said.
McElroy said despite today’s meeting, she’s still moving her cattle off her land 30 miles away in May.
“It’s the nature of a chemical spill so, just unfortunate,” McElroy added. “It’s my backyard, I wish it was somewhere else.”
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