Science academy joining dioxin debate

THE SAGINAW NEWS

The state House has approved legislation that would add a voice to the dioxin debate in mid-Michigan.

Lawmakers unanimously passed a bill Wednesday that would require regulators to recalculate cleanup criteria for dioxin based on the findings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The academy, a nonprofit organization committed to furthering science and technology, is reviewing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's findings on dioxin. It likely will release a critique this summer.

"The best available science, used on a national level, should be incorporated to guide our state-level public health policy," said Rep. John Moolenaar, a Midland Republican who introduced the legislation. "This bill requires the state to base their designations on sound, unbiased science, not arbitrary assumptions."

The legislation could affect hundreds of property owners in Saginaw and Midland counties whose homes lie along the dioxin-tainted Tittabawassee River. The state has called on Dow Chemical Co. to clean up the contamination.

What rankles area lawmakers is that the state has labeled many of the properties as contaminated without specific testing to prove it. Moolenaar said the National Academy of Sciences will give the state a better indication of dioxin's true toxicity.

State Department of Environmental Quality spokesman Robert McCann said his agency has no objection to the bill. He said officials would have reviewed the academy's findings with or without the bill. v

Jeremiah Stettler is a staff writer for The Saginaw News. You may reach him at 776-9685.