Minden ratepayer discusses human waste in New River tributary
MINDEN, WV (WVNS) — Since the 1980’s, state and federal environmental officials have known the town of Minden in Fayette County is contaminated by polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCB, an oil which can cause cancer.
Minden residents reported high rates of cancer and garnered international attention before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA} declared Minden a Superfund site in 2019.
Around 2013, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection had begun tackling another public health concern in Minden: Arbuckle Creek, a tributary of the New River and the same creek which residents had worried, for years, was carrying PCBs from the Superfund site during hard rains and high levels of human waste.
State officials blamed Minden’s dilapidated sewer plant. To fix the problem, WVDEP paid over $20 million to tear down the Minden plant and build a station to pump waste uphill to a sewer plant in Oak Hill for treatment.
In return, the City of Oak Hill involuntarily annexed Minden into city limits and raised Minden residents’ sewer rates to pay for the project to reduce human waste in Arbuckle Creek.
However, WVDEP samples taken as late as 2021 show fecal coliform levels were elevated.
Oak Hill Sanitary Board Chief Operator Butch Whitmore said on Tuesday, April 30, 2024, that a specimen was collected at Thurmond, about one mile before Arbuckle Creek enters the New River and after the creek had left Oak Hill’s sewer plant.
Whitmore said specimens collected closer to the plant showed lower levels of fecal coliform. He said test results suggested fecal coliform levels increased in the Minden area, but he declined to offer an official statement on state test results.
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WVDEP did not respond to requests for interviews to explain the test results.
“We’re doing the best we can,” Whitmore said on Tuesday about Oak Hill Sanitary Board workers.
Whitmore said the Oak Hill sewer plant was given a permit by WVDEP during construction of the pump station and upgrade to the Oak Hill plant from 2018 to 2021, which permitted the plant to release higher levels of fecal coliform into Arbuckle Creek during construction.
Whitmore said the goal is to have no fecal coliform levels.
Minden homeowner Darrell Thomas said he and his wife, the only two residents of his home, pay more than $80 each month for their sewer bill. He pointed out that Arbuckle Creek circulates in the New River and is later treated for drinking water.
He said he still cannot get help from state and federal agencies regarding environmental concerns.
“There’s no need to complain because DEP gives them permits, EPA won’t do [anything], and the health department won’t even talk to you half the time, so, basically, you’re just stuck,” Thomas said. “You either drink it and live with it, or move the hell out.”
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He said state environmental health officials should impose stricter standards for keeping Fayette County water clean, particularly since the area is a tourism mecca and draws whitewater rafting enthusiasts from around the globe to the New River Gorge National Park and Preserve.
“It’s ridiculous. I mean, every time they get a high level, [they say] ‘Oh we got a permit. We got a permit,'” Thomas said. “When do [those] permits stop and the fines start going? The only thing Minden got out of the deal was a higher rate and sewer rate. That’s all they got.”
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