PORT TOWNSEND — A second water sample taken by the city of Port Townsend in response to herbicide spraying on private property near City Lake has come back clean.
Greg Lanning, the city’s public works director, told City Council members Tuesday night that glyphosate was not found in the sample, which was taken Aug. 26 from the city’s water treatment plant.
“The reasons for the second test are many,” Lanning said. “First, to confirm the first test, but we gave it a little bit of a delay so if anything did get into the lake that it would have an opportunity to make it to the testing point.”
The first sample was collected Aug. 20, the day after a helicopter pilot hired by Pope Resources sprayed an herbicide that included glyphosate on private timberland near the lake.
The second sample was taken about a week later.
Pope Resources uses the herbicide to control invasive species and to help seedlings survive after they are planted in a recently harvested area.
City Lake is a reservoir that flows through the city’s water treatment plant and gets distributed as drinking water throughout the system.
Both samples specifically were tested for glyphosate, a weed killer commonly found in Roundup that has been the subject of a class-action lawsuit against Monsanto as a potential cancer-causing chemical.
Lanning said the city purchased two test kits for $250 and sent them separately to Edge Analytical, a certified water-testing facility in Burlington.
Both samples showed glyphosate was not detected in the water supply, Lanning said.
Dozens of Jefferson County residents, some of whom staged a protest along state Highway 20 near the site of the spraying Aug. 19, have spoken at both City Council meetings and during public comment in front of the Board of County Commissioners.
The city’s testing came in response to those concerns, Lanning said.
Mayor Deborah Stinson said the city finalized two letters last week and sent them to Pope Resources as well as the state departments of agriculture and natural resources. County commissioners also finalized a letter that summarized their concerns.
“We did get a response from Pope and an explanation of their position on the matter,” Stinson said during the council meeting Tuesday.
Stinson said Pope Resources is supporting the investigation process and wrote in a letter that they will “adhere to whatever that investigation proves.
“They believe they did follow the law,” Stinson said.
A representative from the state Department of Natural Resources observed the spraying Aug. 20, Pope Resources spokesperson Adrian Miller said.
Chris McGann, a spokesperson from the state Department of Agriculture, said an inspector from the agency observed the spraying and also took samples. Those will be processed at a state lab in Yakima and could take up to a month, he said.
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Jefferson County Managing Editor Brian McLean can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 6, or at bmclean@peninsuladailynews.com.
