DEC announces superfund hearing

The state Department of Environmental Conservation will be soliciting public comment on the cleanup of contamination on land on which Mayflower Cleaners in University Gardens sits, a state Superfund site found decades ago to have leaked possible carcinogen PCE into nearby soil.

A public meeting will be held on Feb. 25 at the Great Neck Public Library’s Main Branch, and the DEC will accept public comment on the cleanup plan from Feb. 20 through March 20.

The inactive Class 2 site – rated by the state as “a significant threat to public health or the environment” – is located at 471-491 Middle Neck Road, and is the location of three commercial buildings and their tenants, including Mayflower Cleaners and an adjacent bagel shop.

In 1992, the Nassau County Department of Health inspected dry wells in the basement of Mayflower Cleaners and found that the operators of the business had regularly drained boiler water into the wells. In 1995, tests revealed PCE contamination, and in 1996 the wells were closed under the supervision of the state Department of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency, according to a DEC press release.

PCE is a chemical used in drycleaning, and has been described as a possible human carcinogen by the EPA.

The DEC’s plan, which is scheduled to be discussed at the public meeting, includes measures already taken to contain the contamination. The DEC proposes upgrading the site’s sub slab depressurization system – a vacuum system designed to prevent people from exposure to vapors.

Mayflower is not the only site in Great Neck linked to PCE contamination.

The owners of the Stanton Cleaners toxic waste site, on the border of Great Neck Plaza and Great Neck Estates, were ordered to pay a six-figure settlement to the EPA and the Department of Justice for costs incurred cleaning up that site from decades of PCE exposure. Stanton Cleaners was named a federal Superfund site in 1999.

“Chemicals like PCE can cause serious health effects and EPA took action to reduce the risks posed by chemicals at this site, including treating of over 270 million gallons of contaminated ground water, installing systems to take vapors out of the soil that can get into buildings and installing a system in a building where vapors were getting in,” said EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck in an October press release announcing the settlement. “With this settlement, the parties responsible for the pollution are being held accountable for their part in the contamination.”

The Great Neck peninsula is home to several other groundwater contamination sites, according to the EPA.

A 2003 EPA report lists the Fenley Amoco gas station on Great Neck Road, the Citizen’s Development Company at 47 Northern Boulevard, Amoco gas station on Cuttermill Road and Jonathan’s Auto Repair Shop on Great Neck Road as sites that at one point contaminated local groundwater.