Hospital Will Go Forward With Plan To Add Second Floor
By David Howell
Editor
WATER VALLEY – The Board of Supervisors and Yalobusha General Hospital Board of Trustees held a joint meeting Monday to map out construction details for planned work at the county-owned hospital. The afternoon meeting at the Water Valley courthouse follows years of planning for a second floor addition at the 55-year old hospital to house a geropsych and chemical dependency unit.
The planned work at the hospital also includes interior and exterior renovations and is part of a broader, eight-plus million dollar project that will also include an off-site assisted living center and wellness center owned and operated by Yalobusha Health Services (YHS), according to YHS administrator Terry Varner.
The complicating factor and primary topic Monday was environmental concerns stemming from the trichloroethylene (TCE) contamination in the area around the hospital. Supervisors awarded a $5 million bid for the second floor addition and renovations at the hospital to Century Construction back in September. That bid was subsequently rejected by supervisors in November after concerns surfaced about the use of piers to support the second floor at the hospital. The piers require deep penetration in the ground and could disturb the TCE in the soil and ground water.
Varner told the Herald that the hospital initially planned to go back to the drawing board to change the design and not utilize a second floor, but after discussion in Monday’s meeting, both hospital trustees and supervisors were in favor of using original plans.
“MDEQ has come to a decision that is going to allow us to go with our existing designs and drawing,” Varner explained after the meeting. “It saves us the expense of having to go back to the drawing board.”
Monday’s discussion also centered on design work for the hospital addition that will include plans to monitor the air and remediate the problem, a precautionary step if vapor intrusion becomes a problem in the future.
Vapor Intrusion
The threat of vapor intrusion prompted renewed scrutiny from MDEQ starting early last year in the decades-old contamination from the former Colt/Holley Carburetor plant. At a public meeting last April MDEQ Executive Director Gary Rikard reported the TCE contamination does not affect the city’s drinking water, which is different from the ground water, as there are no wells in the area. But Rikard reported his agency’s interest was prompted by new vapor intrusion guidelines implemented by the EPA in 2015. Rikard defined vapor intrusion as the process where vapors from the underground solvents travel upward through the soil. Vapor intrusion can become a health threat the TCE enters a home or building as a vapor and is inhaled over an extended period of time.
“As long as it stays down in the ground we are okay, but it can get airborne,” Board Attorney John Crow noted during Monday’s meeting. Crow, whose firm is part of a group of plaintiff attorneys representing multiple clients in the contaminated area including the Yalobusha County and Yalobusha General Hospital, and individual homeowners, noted that TCE is not airborne at the hospital.
Crow also said lack of action by MDEQ has contributed to the spread of TCE.
“Decades ago, they messed up,” Crow explained. “It got contaminated and ruined a lot of ground far beyond BorgWarner,” Crow explained, referring to the spread of the contaminated area defined as a plume that spans an area north of the industrial site and includes an estimated 28 residences and 11 commercial buildings on portions of South Main Street, Frostland Drive and Champion Circle. The contaminated area includes the county-owned hospital and nursing home and Department of Health building on South Main.
“We are using Neil Schaffer from the environmental engineering side to give us an outside opinion from MDEQ,” Varner said.
Board President Cayce Washington also said MDEQ’s approval of the hospital plans is a big step, even if the agency did not take adequate steps to address the contamination earlier.
“This thing has got lot more scrutiny, the attorney general’s got his hand in it,” Washington said, referring a a lawsuit filed earlier in the year by Attorney General Jim Hood against EnPro Industries, Inc., Goodrich Corporation and Oldco, LLC claiming the defendants polluted the environment and contaminated the groundwater with TCE.
“They (MDEQ) are not going to okay something that is going to give us some problems 10 or 20 years down the road,” Washington said about the approval from the state agency for the work.
Washington also praised hospital officials for their commitment to healthcare.
“Y’all are providing a tremendous service to this community, a tremendous amount of jobs. We are proud of it. We don’t want to impede that, but at the same time because of the sensitivity of the chemical, we wanted to take a precautionary measure,” Washington said about Monday’s meeting.
Financing
Varner reported the entire project hinges on securing multiple funding sources including state grant money, New Market Tax Credits and other sources expected to provide a minimum of 50 percent of the total cost and will not have to be repaid. After Monday’s meeting Varner also told the Herald that in order to meet the requirements for the funding sources the entire project – hospital work, wellness center and assisted living facility – will be bid together. The project is expected to go out for bid next year.
