Tests along Neponset find no risk from prior contamination

Hikers, runners, cyclists, and dog-walkers who frequent the Neponset River's shores can breathe a little easier. The results of tests performed last December and January on soil along the river bank show that - with one exception - there is no contamination from dredging done in the river in the 1960s. Testing was done on the Milton and Boston sides of the river.

The one problematic area found was near the state Department of Conservation and Recreation building on Brush Hill Avenue in Milton. There, officials found elevated lead concentrations that will require limited removal of contaminated soil.

State officials will discuss their findings at two public meetings, the first tomorrow from 6 to 8 p.m., at Hyde Park Branch Library, 35 Harvard Ave., Hyde Park. The second will be May 6, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., at St. Gregory School, 2214 Dorchester Ave., Dorchester.

Officials from the state departments of Environmental Protection, Conservation and Recreation, and Fish and Game initiated the sampling program to determine the safety of soil dredged from the Neponset River in the 1960s and deposited along the shoreline. At issue was whether the soil contained polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, which can cause cancer - or metals such as lead and arsenic from industrial waste.

The issue of possible contamination on the river's banks is separate from the issue of PCBs in the river bed, from past industrial usages along the river. A federal study released in January showed PCB levels in river sediments at the Tileston & Hollingsworth dam in Hyde Park, for instance, as high as 231 parts per million; anything over 2 parts per million is considered unsafe. The state is studying remediation options, including removing two state-owned dams.

RICH FAHEY