Shooting range cleanup to cost Forest Service nearly $1 million

[Ptah]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service expects to pay $980,000 to remove contaminated soil where the former Prescott Sportsmen’s Club Shooting Range (PSC) site existed off Iron Springs and North Granite Basin roads near the Wildwood Estates subdivision. The Forest Service and PSC identified high lead levels in the soil after 57 years’ use as a shooting range.


The Forest Service collected soil and sediment samples in 2002, 2007 and 2016, and determined levels exceeded the Arizona Residential Soil Remediation Level (RSRL) for lead, set at 400 mg/kg.

Test results – six soil and sediment samples – from 2002 indicated lead concentrations up to 10,000 mg/kg. In 2007, an X-ray fluorescence instrument found lead concentration levels up to 15,600 mg/kg in 21 samples. Most recently, 408 samples of up to 28,000 mg/kg classified the soils as hazardous waste.

The Club operated the shooting range under a special use permit that expired Dec. 31, 2014. The Forest Service no longer permits shooting sports activities at the site, and PSC has since moved to Chino Valley. Prior to closing, 1,500 to 3,000 visitors typically used the site, stated the Forest Service Removal Action Approval Memorandum dated Nov. 21.

http://www.dcourier.com/news/2017/jan/05/shooting-range-cleanup-cost-forest-service-nearly-/

[SHRED]

1. Why isn't the club being charged?

[Ptah]

2. Forest Service Removal Action Approval Memorandum dated Nov. 21.

The Club removed its structures and facilities in 2015, “but did not have the funds to conduct a cleanup of the soil,” the memo stated, and remediation action could not wait until money became available.

The poor club couldn't afford to clean it up,but they have opened another shooting range.

[cilla4progress]

3. This happens all around where I live

At random places throughout the national forest. These shooters apparently don't think they have to clean up after themselves and they don't. Leaves a hideous toxic mess.