Arco children get free testing

by Jack Morse
The Brunswick News

Arco residents are safe, it seems, from lead and other hazardous materials used for years at the nearby, now-defunct LCP Chemical plant.

The Environmental Protection Agency determined that, based on recent soil samples, only one area near the corner of West Oak and Palmetto streets is contaminated with higher-than-healthy traces of lead.

Because the property is vacant, no one is in any real danger, said David Mellard, an Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry toxicologist who reviewed the
sampling data.

Still, it’s not a bad idea for parents to have their children tested for levels of lead in their blood.

“It’s just good public health practice,” he said. “We recommend that for anyone.”

Such advice doesn’t worry Bill Owens, President of the Glynn Environmental Coalition.

“Everything I read tells me children everywhere should be tested for lead anyway,” Owens said.

But children in the Arco area might want to be especially sure they’re safe, so the Glynn County Health Department is offering free blood lead level tests for children up to age 6 who live in the Arco soil sampling area.

Children 6 and younger are at the highest risk for ill health effects due to lead exposure.

For information, call the health department at 264-3961.