Remediation Continues At Gould Manor Park

FAIRFIELD, CT — Work to remove contamination continues at Gould Manor Park as plans progress to remediate other public sites after contaminants were discovered across Fairfield in connection with an investigation of the town fill pile.

At Gould Manor, most of the areas planned for remediation have been excavated and backfilled with clean material, according to an update Thursday from the town. Two spots with elevated arsenic levels along fencing between the sidewalk and baseball field will be excavated and tested in the coming days. The space between the pond and sidewalk at the park, which also contains elevated amounts of arsenic, will not be accessible until additional excavation and testing is finished in the next few weeks.

Work at Gould Manor began in mid-October. It was initially anticipated to take about 10 days but is requiring more time than expected to complete, in part due to weather, Health Department Director Sands Cleary has said. Cleary did not immediately respond Friday to a request for comment.

The town is remediating sites in the order in which they were tested for contaminants, Cleary has said.

In Burroughs Park, excavation was expected to be finished this week and backfilling is projected to be done by the end of next week, the update said. A remediation plan for Jennings Elementary School was submitted Wednesday by consultant Tighe and Bond to the town and Fairfield school system, with work to begin as soon as in the coming weeks. A plan is also being put together for remediation of contaminated soil along a playground walkway at Mill Hill Elementary School. Previously scheduled renovations at the school will involve the removal of the sidewalk in 2020.

The Jennings Beach playground, the area behind the Old Dam Road recreation building and the former McKinley Elementary School playground are in various stages of testing and remediation planning, according to the update.

Test results for the following sites are expected in the coming days: Coral Drive, High Ridge Road, Osborn Hill School, Ronald Drive, Stratfield Road and Sunset Avenue. The locations appear on a list of about 20 potentially contaminated sites not included on the town's initial list of priority testing locations. Testing dates for the remainder of the places on the secondary list are being determined.

Since August, at least 66 areas in Fairfield have been tested for contamination amid concerns about misuse of fill. The vast majority have been deemed safe, but some sites were found to contain asbestos, arsenic and other contaminants.

Fairfield has accrued roughly $609,000 in costs connected to environmental consulting, remediation and additional expenses for sites other than the town fill pile, according to information presented to the Board of Finance at a meeting in late October. Another approximately $406,000 is projected to be spent on similar services.

The town's contamination crisis started after Fairfield hired Julian Development in 2013 to operate the fill pile and reduce its size by 40,000 cubic yards. Over the next three years, the pile more than doubled in size, and days before the agreement was set to end, PCBs and lead were discovered on the property.

Police opened an investigation in 2017. In August, former public works superintendent Scott Bartlett, former director of public works Joe Michelangelo and Julian Companies Owner Jason Julian were arrested on multiple felony charges in connection with the pile.

For more information about contamination testing and remediation, visit www.fairfieldct.org/filluseissues.