In the shadow of Lookout Mountain, this locked gate faces Wilson Road near 51st Street in Piney Woods. The former Velsicol property has since been vacated.A comment deadline for a controversial plan to finalize Velsicol’s clean-up requirement for its 36-acre former plant site in South Chattanooga has been extended.
Officials with the Tennessee Department of Conservation and Environment on Thursday announced that regulators will continue to accept comments on the company’s request to modify its hazardous waste permit until Feb. 11. The deadline had been set for Friday.
Earlier this month, community residents became upset with the planned modification after state and company officials held a public meeting in Alton Park and said the remaining contaminants on the site will not be removed.
The site, under the revised plan, would be covered with 12 and 18 inches of clean soil and fenced.
Officials said deed covenants would be written to relegate any future use of the land as only for industrial purposes.
TDEC spokeswoman Tisha Calabrese-Benton said a request from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Control, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, sought the extension – as did a number of citizens.
“We had several requests to extend the comment period, including a request from ATSDR, and we extended it in order to accommodate those requests,” she said.
ATSDR is charged under the Superfund Act of 1980 to assess the presence and nature of health hazards at specific Superfund sites.
Read more in tomorrow’s Times Free Press.