A NewsChannel 5 Investigation is raising questions about whether an old charcoal plant is making people sick.

The federal government said it’s safe to live near one of the state’s most poluuted sites.

“They just overlook us sometimes,” said Lee Horbeak who lives on Oak Hill Road in Wrigley.

He lives the site for the old Wrigley Charcoal plant

“Mostly everybody around here has something wrong with them,” he said.

He said people are sick all around him.  He blames the plant, which produced charcoal and iron. At one point it was under control of the U.S. military. It closed in 1966.

Today, the site is a mess. A plastics-recycling company operates on top of the property, but the problem is underground. Toxic waste from the old plant contaminated the groundwater and the soil. 

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now claims the “site does not pose a significant health risk.” But, in 1988, the EPA declared the site “an eminent and substantial danger.” Since then the EPA has cleaned up some areas, but they also discovered new contamination.

“I felt betrayed so long I don’t even have a feeling about it anymore,” said Bill Goodreau, who owns 35 acres beside the site.

The tattered trailers are all that’s left of his dream to develop the property. He said there’s still toxic tar on his property   Tar is a dangerous byproduct from the plant the EPA has removed from several areas near his property.

He said his spring has residue as a result of buried toxic waste.

When asked if he got sick from drinking the water, Goodreau said, “Right.”

He also said the cutting grass posed was hazardous because he “inhaled major amounts of dust because we bulldozed it twice.”

In 2006, he was diagnosed with toxic metal poisoning.  He now takes more than 12 pills a day. 

Doctors found high levels of arsenic, mercury and manganese in his system.  EPA tests also revealed all of those are present at the site.

When asked if it dangerous to live near that superfund site, EPA environmental scientist Loften Carr said, “No, based on all the data we’ve collected to date current conditions, it is safe to live near that site.”

Superfund refers to the government’s program “to clean up the nation’s uncontrolled hazardous waste sites,” according to the EPA’s Web site.

Full Story and Video at: http://www.newschannel5.com/Global/story.asp?S=8711644