- [Dana] Several years after toxic PFAS chemicals were discovered on Spokane's West Plains, many residents still don't have safe drinking water, not to mention, clean water for their gardens or livestock.

- I'm always second guessing myself now as a mother.

Can we eat this or not?

- [Dana] We'll meet a local family of eight that put a lot of work into homesteading their dream property only to learn many of their vegetables and eggs are too dangerous to eat.

Plus, how student researchers from Eastern Washington University are tracking the flow of water underground to inform future cleanup efforts.

- Everybody deserves to have clean drinking water.

It should be something that's accessible to everybody.

- This is At Issue.

(upbeat music) Hello and thank you for joining us.

I'm your host, Dana Haynes.

Here on At Issue, we go in depth to examine the local topics that impact you.

Today's issue, the dangerous PFAS contaminating the water on the Spokane West Plains.

The discovery of the so-called Forever Chemicals in our area was made public in 2017, but years later, we're still learning just how serious this issue is and how widespread the contamination is.

Joining me for this important conversation is Mark Loucks, the Chief of Environmental Restoration for the Air Force Civil Engineer Center.

Dr.

Briana Brinkman, the Washington Department of Ecology Cleanup Manager.

Barb Morrissey, a toxicologist from the Washington Department of Health.

Dr.

Francisco Velazquez, the Spokane Regional Health Officer and Co-Chair of Spokane County's West Plains PFAS Task Force.

Dr.

Chad Pritchard, a researcher and geosciences professor at Eastern Washington University.

And John Hancock, president of the West Plains Water Coalition.

We wanna thank all of you for joining us today for this very important topic.

I wanna ask a question that's probably easiest for all of you to answer, but hard for the rest of us to remember and even pronounce.

We'll start with Dr.

Brinkman or Brie.

You said it was okay to call you Brie as well.

I'll start with you.

What does PFAS stand for?

- So, PFAS stands for poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances.

We tend to have a long A, so we can differentiate it from one of the analytes PFOS that we talk about quite often.

It is a group of synthetic manmade chemicals that have a carbon fluorine bond and this bond is really strong.

- Good explanation.

Well, even if you don't live on the West Plains, you likely have PFAS in your home.

Let's learn more about these so-called Forever Chemicals right now.

PFAS are a large group of chemicals developed to make things waterproof, stain-resistant, and non-stick.

They have been dubbed Forever Chemicals because they break down very slowly.

They also build up in people, wildlife, and the environment.

The chemicals have been around since the 1940s.

You may find them in stain-resistant furniture or carpet, waterproof clothing, non-stick cookware, food packaging with greaseproof or waterproof coatings, cosmetics, paints, sealers and waxes.

PFAS are also used in aqueous film-forming foam called AFFF, which is used to put out fuel fires.

AFFF was used for decades at both Fairchild Air Force Base and Spokane International Airport.

Even though it's no longer in use, the firefighting foam is the primary suspected source of PFAS contaminated drinking water in Eastern Washington and many other areas across the country.

As a matter of fact, drinking water is a significant amount of a person's total exposure to PFAS during their lifetime.

Long-term exposure can cause serious health problems, including high cholesterol, reproductive and developmental issues, thyroid problems, and certain cancers.

There are currently more than 9,000 different PFAS chemicals and it's estimated that 98% of people in the US have the Forever Chemicals in their bodies, which is why we are learning how to reduce our exposure and why it's important for all of us, not just those who live on Spokane's West Plains.

Mark, you're joining us from the Air Force Civil Engineering Center.

What is that center all about and how do you help Fairchild Air Force Base in this particular situation?

- One of the things that we do and we're responsible for is cleaning up all these past or, you know, Brie called them legacy contaminants, but also any of these emerging contaminants, what these perfluorinated compounds or PFAS.

You know, that's also as part of our responsibility.

- Talk a little bit about why FFF was so effective at putting out fuel fires and the fact that it was also required.

- It's one of those chemicals that creates a barrier for oxygen.

So, when you spray that out on a petroleum fire, it's doing two things.

It spreads out on there.

It smothers the fire because it takes away the oxygen and also it takes away all the heat.

And when you take away the heat, there is no chance for ignition.

And it has worked to save countless lives across all the Department of Defense services.

- And that's was gonna be my next question.

When it's a life or death situation, and obviously, a fire on a plane, especially in the case of Fairchild, you know, a fueler, it's so important to get it out quickly, which goes back to why this chemical was required in the first place because of what you just said.

- Correct.

- Correct, yeah.

- Thankfully there aren't a lot of plane crashes that we've had to deal with here locally or emergencies where we needed to deploy the foam.

But it was used very regularly in training.

And if you can explain a little bit about why that's important on a base, any base but Fairchild specific.

- Yeah, well, in Fairchild's just like all the other bases in that our firefighters need to train.

We have weekly training, monthly training.

I mean, there's all sorts of training that they do.

And they need to be able to use this equipment so that when emergency arises, they're ready to deploy out for that emergency and be able to save as many lives as possible if need be.

And this stuff's been very good for that.

- How long was it used on Fairchild Air Force Base?

- So, in the Air Force, we started using this in 1970, and we're now just getting it out of our, out of all uses within the installation.

- Well, Spokane International Airport also used AFFF firefighting foam as they are in the early stages of investigating contamination on their property.

I sat down with leadership from the airport a couple days ago to learn more about the steps they are taking and we'll hear from them throughout the show.

First, I ask them to talk about the history of the airport, which includes decades of military use and the use of AFFF on the property.

- Spokane International was formed in 1938 by Spokane County.

They saw that commercial aviation was growing rapidly, so they cited a new facility on about 1,300 acres.

And then came World War II in 1940.

The facility was sold to the Department of War in the day, and they operated the facility as a B-17 bomber training facility.

In 1946, the airport was turned back over to the county, but the military maintained a presence in Spokane International.

- For airports in particular, PFAS come into play because they are a component in AFFF.

So, AFFF or aqueous film-forming foam is the product of choice as airports and military go to respond to emergencies around the world.

Since the late 1960s, actually, the Federal Aviation Administration, FAA, has mandated within the US that airports use PFAS for this type of emergency response.

And that has come with a requirement that they have to conduct training exercises as well as test their equipment.

And that results in the usage of AFFF.

- How often do you think it was deployed in training or what have you, even through the military years at what is now Spokane International Airport?

- I can't speak on behalf of the military, but I know from our perspective, we've never had a major incident.

We've never had to deploy a large amount of AFFF to combat an incident, a fire of any kind.

We did dispense it annually as part of our certification process.

Kenia also referenced to help calibrate our firefighting equipment to make sure it met the FAA's requirements for response.

But it's relatively a small amount on each dispensing.

And then we haven't dispense AFFF since 2016 and we adopted a new system, a no foam system.

It's an apparatus that's installed the machine that allows you to spray the water but bypass the foam system.

- In 2017 is when I know, starting I think at Fairchild, but we were informed that maybe this was contaminating some water sources.

Were you guys at any point before that told by the FAA or anybody else for that, any government agency that, "Hey, we think there might be a problem with this foam."

- In 2017, we did hear of Fairchild Air Force Base identifying that there was some contamination.

And as part of that, FAA was in the process of evaluating what type of process and chemical could be deployed.

AFFF is at that time was still required and federally mandated.

Since then, they have transitioned and provided guidance as to what to transition to.

As soon as the FAA identified now the F3, which is the new fluorine-free foam, we were one of the first to acquire that as an airport and have that as a purchase order to be able to obtain that new process and the new chemical.

- Brie, initially the airport says their initial studies, and of course they're still in the thick of studying the situation, that they show there's not a pathway at this moment from the PFAS contamination on their property to the drinking water.

Can you elaborate on those findings and just how complex this issue is of determining where contamination starts?

- Yeah, so in a typical contaminated site, we go from the first initial investigation and we step out.

So, we are following the pathway of contamination as it moves through the subsurface.

So, typically this is through groundwater.

We are in the preliminary steps of gathering information at Spokane International Airport.

And so, they did get studies back on soil that shows that there was contamination well above our cleanup level that we would expect our cleanups to achieve.

And so, as we're kind of progressing with the airport, some of the things that we are looking at are how is that progressing offsite?

So there are right off the tip of Spokane International Airport connects into Garden Springs, which is directly on their boundary.

- And Mark, I'll ask you the same question as it relates to Fairchild 'cause I know they are separate investigations.

Can you see the source of how it got into the drinking water?

- Yeah, so at Fairchild Air Force Base, and we are under what's called a federal facility agreement, where we work with the EPA, Region 10, also the state of Washington and also the Department of Health.

And we follow what's called the CERCLA of process.

CERCLA means Comprehensive Response, Compensation, and Liability Act.

And that's a set of laws.

It's some people refer to as Superfund.

And so under CERCLA, there's a specific process that we go to.

And so, when the EPA came out in 2016 with their health advisory for groundwater or drinking water, the Air Force began what we call the preliminary investigation and site investigations, or a preliminary assessment and site investigations.

And so, what we've done is that we've looked at all the areas where we have used this AFFF and we defined what the, you know, in the areas where it was used.

And we also determined, one of the things that we saw very quickly is that there was these PFOA and PFOS compounds or all these fluorinated things that were leaving the installation.

And so, once we found that out, then the Air Force became very, very proactive in that we notified everybody that would be within what we thought was the flow paths.

And for all these people that have been impacted at this level above 70, we have provided a second source of water for them.

First of all, we provided bottled water, which is well, that was something we could do immediately.

And then went in and put in remedial systems or mitigation systems that took the PFAS components out of their drinking water.

- Dr.

Velazquez, drinking water contaminated with PFAS seems to be a bigger health threat than how we're exposed to it in other ways, make up different things.

Why is that?

- So, that's a really good question.

If you think about exposure, the three questions we need to answer first, how were you exposed?

Ingestion, inhalation, touch?

How long were you exposed for?

And how much were you exposed to?

So if you think about it, makeup or non-stick pans, the little bit that flakes off.

So that's episodic.

It's not constant and it's not a lot of exposure.

If you think about drinking water, well, all seven us a year are drinking water.

We drink water all the time, we cook with it.

So the amount and that you're exposed to because of the concentration in water is much higher.

That's why we focus a lot on the water 'cause it's the most significant contributor right now to that potential contamination that people are seeing.

- Right.

Thank you, Doctor.

I wanna skip over to John.

John, we might have actually skipped this earlier, but talk a little bit about your work with the West Plains Water Coalition.

What you're trying to do for the homeowners out there, maybe the homeowners that have these very questions we're talking about.

What is your role?

- This work began three years ago next month when an acquaintance neighbor of mine who lives on Deep Creek, eight miles from the Air Force Base, that's my home, said that her husband had died suddenly of pancreatic cancer.

Her mother died of breast cancer, two of their dogs died of cancer.

And then a letter came in the mail from Fairchild that said, "We tested your water, stop drinking it."

And who could imagine that eight miles from the Air Force Base there would be a pollution problem.

And she asked my help of what to do about it.

And I didn't know anything about PFAS, I'm not a scientist, but there was information out there that just was not easy to find.

Now we have 500 on our team in the West Plains Water Coalition with the same questions.

What's out there?

What do we do about it?

And should we wait around for other people to rescue us?

Or is this a self-help project?

So the role of the coalition is outreach and education towards the public using all the information that we can get from all these agencies that are now working together to try to understand this and figure out what to do.

- And do you guys, I mean, you said, somebody said beforehand that you all work together, that you all knew each other.

Do you work together well with all of these people?

I'm just gonna ask you the- - Well, the agency restrictions on what each of them gets to do or each one of them is required to do are all different.

But from the community, we're just looking at the problem.

What has to happen to make life safer for us in our own homes.

And the expertise that we have here is not lacking and the science has told us enough, but it takes a lot of will to simply accept the danger of something that's invisible.

And homeowners who who live in the country have accepted the duty for a whole lot of systems, including fresh water and waste removal.

And so, there are resourceful people who have chosen to live in the country accepting certain risks and duties.

But water pollution over a hundred square miles is a duty that's way larger than any homeowner can take.

- Well, the contamination is impacting hundreds of homeowners on private wells all over the West Plains.

We met one family facing challenges beyond the kitchen faucet.

(bright music) It was a dream 10 years in the making for Will and Rashele Birmingham.

Buy a piece of land in the country, build a home, grow their own food, and raise their children away from the hustle and bustle of the city.

- This is supposed to be our forever home where we can homestead and raise our kids out in the country.

- [Dana] They found the perfect spot, nestled between Spokane and Airway Heights, land with beautiful views and enough space to let their dream grow.

- So we moved on to our land in March of 2022 into a camper actually with four kids and a baby on the way.

- [Dana] The Birminghams were aware of the PFAS contamination on the West Plains, but believed they were far enough away from the danger.

To be safe, they had their water tested.

The results did indicate PFAS were present but below the government standards at the time.

- We figured we were good.

We put in a drinking water filter just to be on the safe side.

And then we went on with our life.

- [Dana] For the next two years and through a lot of their own labor, the dream started to take root.

They built a home, planted a fruit orchard, and a huge vegetable garden, and started raising chickens and rabbits all while their family continued to grow.

But everything changed in April of 2024 when the Department of Ecology reached out.

- I was nine months pregnant, just like a week away from my due date with our sixth baby.

And they test our water and we find out that our levels are extremely high.

And at that point we're still thinking our drinking water is probably fine.

And we honestly had no idea the impact on our land for the garden, the things we wouldn't be able to eat for the orchard and for our animals.

And we were consuming chicken eggs at that time, feeding them to our children.

I was pregnant and eating them, breastfeeding and eating them, giving them to very small children.

- [Dana] Almost a year later, Rashele would learn they shouldn't have been eating those eggs.

- They confirmed our levels March 2025 were so high in the eggs from just the water being contaminated that we should not have been consuming them at all, they were toxic.

- [Dana] A terrifying discovery for a mom trying to make healthy choices for her family.

- We were angry and scared about what the health ramifications were.

- For now, an under the sink filtration system in the kitchen provides the only drinkable water on the property.

And the Birmingham still have to figure out a way to get safe water to the crops and animals.

- And we don't get to eat eggs.

We just put the eggs around.

- We have to completely reclaim this whole spot, we gotta move the chicken coop.

This whole area as well, it's not usable because the chickens also, that's how they detox is they get rid of it through their feces and urine.

And so, this whole area is now technically contaminated and the chickens, as you can see, they're gonna expose themselves some more.

- [Dana] As for the vegetables, they've been watered with contaminated water and fertilized with rabbit manure, which is also contaminated.

- And this is the flowers we picked.

- [Child] No, picking mom's flowers.

- [Dana] Some of their vegetables, like squash, corn, and tomatoes, are believed to be safe.

But other things like leafy greens are not.

And the research continues to evolve.

It creates a lot of uncertainty, especially for parents.

- To have complete peace of mind as a mom that I'm not poisoning my kids with the own food that I'm growing, which I'm growing because it's better than store-bought food supposedly, right?

I would have to move my whole garden.

- You have to completely rethink your entire design, especially with six little kids.

Time is of the essence.

There's a lot of work that happens at five in the morning.

(bright music) - [Dana] But even with what has felt like one obstacle after another, Will and Rashele say they've put in too much hard work to give up on their dream now.

- We do intend to stay here.

This is our forever home.

(bright music fades) - All right.

Great family.

Barb, we wanna talk a little bit about health concerns.

We'll get back to those eggs in a minute but I do wanna ask you how PFAS build up in the bodies and why can't our bodies flush it out?

- So, not all PFAS build up in our bodies, but the ones that we're most concerned about, PFOS, PFHSX, PFOA, they do build up in our bodies.

And the way that happens is that they're very easily absorbed when we swallow them in food or water or if we inhale them.

And once they're in the body, they bind to elements in our blood and they bind tightly to protein in our liver, in our kidneys, in other tissues, reproductive tissues, even in the bone.

And our body is just very slow at getting rid of them through the urinary tract.

It actually does send them out but then the kidney reabsorbs them.

- What are some of the other conditions or cancers kind of linked to this group of chemicals?

- So, that's things like people with higher exposure might have higher serum cholesterol, they might have slightly lower birth weights for their babies.

The immune system in their children may mount a weaker response to childhood vaccines.

There are some reproductive risks around hypertension and blood pressure.

So, during pregnancy there's higher rates of preeclampsia and gestational hypertension.

And some impacts on the liver as well.

And then in terms of cancer, the strongest associations are with kidney and testicular cancer at this point.

There's a lot of research going into many other things like metabolic problems and diabetes and breast cancer but I think that the evidence isn't quite strong enough.

There's a lot of mixed evidence and so, it's a little bit hard to tell what's going on there, but I think that that list could change over time.

- Dr.

Velazquez, have we heard of any health problems on the West Plains directly related to the contamination there?

- Currently, there are a lot of people that have expressed concerns about health conditions that they may have, a neighbor has or a family member has.

Unfortunately at this point we don't have the causation.

There's a correlation.

So I don't wanna minimize the concerns that people have but I cannot say that their high cholesterol, for example, was caused by PFAS exposure 'cause high cholesterol it has multiple factors.

Genetics and diet and activity.

There are a lot of reasons.

I think with PFAS we're moving very, very fast.

The research is totally amazing and the speed that it's moving is amazing.

It's changing almost every week there's something new that we need to add to the literature that we're following.

- Going back to Barb for just a second, when it relates to this chicken egg situation, we heard the Birminghams kind of explain it, but if you could explain like why those were specially toxic and why they shouldn't be eating their chicken eggs.

- (chuckles) So, what happens with chickens and ducks, and poultry, and honestly other farm animals is they also ingest the PFAS.

So, they were drinking the same water.

The chickens are also pecking around in the dirt and they're eating bugs that are hatching out of the dirt.

And so, a chicken actually can clear the PFAS from their body much faster than human beings.

So, for human beings, we're on the scale of years to get rid of PFAS from our bodies and chickens that our laying eggs can do it in about 30 days in the lab, right?

So they are fast eliminators, however, you have to completely stop their exposure.

So, we actually tested eggs from 30 families across the West Plains and in another community called East Selah in the Yakima County.

And 80% of those families were told to reduce the amount of eggs they regularly eat from their flock because of PFOS and PFHXS.

There was almost always PFOS, sometimes there was PFHXS.

So, until they can lower the amount of PFAS in the eggs we're saying you should cut back on your regular consumption.

- What about consumption of other things in this region or around the contamination?

Fish, livestock.

Like what's the situation there?

- Yeah, so we have done a little bit of testing in livestock as well.

We tested the blood of live cows for people who are trying to decide should I butcher now or should I move them to another pasture for six months and let them clear?

'Cause cows can also get rid of the PFAS if you can stop their exposure.

We've also tested raw pork, beef, turkey, and chicken.

So we've got some samples to show us that it's not as big of a problem, it's not as frequent of a problem.

We still had one out of four families be told to cut back or not eat any of their meat based on the level.

So it is a problem.

It absolutely needs to get folded in to the PFAS response and I think that's what our project showed is like, oh, whew, this is actually, these are on par with the kinds of exposures people are getting through their drinking water.

And if we are mitigating that, we should be addressing this as well because this is ongoing exposure for people.

- And these are people who have moved to pieces of land to do just that.

- Exactly.

- Be family farmers, live off their land, raise their own livestock for butchering and for feeding their families.

- Right.

- And we heard a little bit about the fruit gardens or the vegetable gardens and the fruit orchards.

- Yes.

- That the contamination was high there.

Is there an explanation or is it just a matter of, like you said, there's more PFAS, PFOS left there.

- It looks like from the most recent studies, it has to be kind of a lot in the irrigation water for plants, for you to detect it in the plant.

So, it's possible it's not as big of a problem as the uptake in livestock.

We don't really know.

We are hoping to test more vegetables.

We did test some vegetables for the Birmingham and we did not find PFAS in those vegetables.

But that doesn't mean that there aren't other vegetables that they're growing that might have it.

- Well getting into a piece of the studies being done out there.

Dr.

Pritchard is currently wrapping up a two-year study with the Department of Ecology to track down the contamination.

He let us tag along with his team so that we can better understand what's happening under the surface.

(upbeat music) From the dirt just underfoot to the deep channels of groundwater below, PFAS went unnoticed for decades in the unique geology under Spokane's West Plains.

But thanks to a grant from the Washington Department of Ecology and an Eastern Washington University geosciences professor, the Forever Chemicals can't hide any longer.

Dr.

Chad Pritchard and his team of student research assistants spent the last two years testing hundreds of private and public wells, as well as rivers, creeks, and lakes to measure the spread of PFAS through water.

The project combines two of Pritchard's passions, geology and community.

- Oh, to me, I just love this area.

I mean, it's a fantastic area geologically and people-wise and groundwater is very important.

This one's kinda more important probably than like figuring out the age of a piece of granite because people are drinking groundwater and we wanna make sure it's clean.

- [Dana] He's also inspiring the next generation of geologists.

- Everybody deserves to have clean drinking water.

It should be something that's accessible to everybody.

And the fact that something like this could be causing long-term issues just doesn't sit right.

- I love to help people and I love that I get to inform them at least so at least they know what's going on around them and they aren't just blind to it all.

- [Dana] The grant covers water testing fees for participating households with private wells.

A test that would otherwise cost each homeowner three to $400.

- [Sydney] We have two samples that we'll take.

It's a pretty quick process.

- [Dana] Samples are then sent to Anatek, an accredited environmental testing facility in Moscow, Idaho.

And when the results come back, the findings don't just go into a report.

They impact real people.

- They're the nicest people in the world and then I have to turn around and say, "Here's a water well report where you are well above the drinking water standard.

And it's just, oh God, I was not ready for that.

- But it's been really cool to come out to so many houses, meet all these people and so many of them are really, really happy to, you know, that we have this grant and we're able to do this testing for them.

And it's the whole project's been really rewarding to work on.

- [Dana] While helping people is a priority for this team, they're also digging deeper into some cool technology.

The grant helped Pritchard get state-of-the-art groundwater modeling software to create 3D water flow maps.

- And that way we can get a better understanding of where contamination is going.

- [Dana] Knowing what's going on underground is a critical step to inform future cleanup efforts and help provide a path to safe drinking water.

- This is sort of an artistic rendition of our kind of West Plains project that the West Plains Coalition put together.

- [Dana] Pritchard says the variations in the West Plains' landscape, the areas of rock, gravel, and sand that formed over millions of years have an impact on the way water collects and moves underground.

- These old drainages that probably existed the last 10 million years since the basalts have, they've all been eroded through, so we know they're pretty old.

But then the Missoula floods came through and then the sand and gravel got deposited in these old drainages, so it all looks flat, the West Plains, right?

But there's these cool drainages underneath it.

- [Dana] The drainages are also called paleochannels, which are inactive river beds that have been filled in with gravel and sand over time.

That porous mixture allows the groundwater to move fast in those areas, but significantly slower through the surrounding rocky basalt.

- So when we're talking about like contamination of Fairchild, even stuff from the '70s is still making its way down a lot of these basaltic aquifers downgradient.

It's not pristine water, that is period.

We have done a pretty good job of leaving a mark here.

(water burbling) - Dr.

Pritchard, how do you hope the results from this study will impact the people who live on the West Plains specifically?

- Yeah, just knowledge is power, so to speak and the community can stand up.

I do really appreciate the Department of Health having an alternative drinking water.

And so, if we can provide residents with a well test that says it's above the drinking water standard, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and they can go to Fairchild or they used to be able to, a lot of people did at least to get drinking water or filters.

And so, they had an immediate response where they could actually help to save potentially their family.

- I'm just gonna go ahead and say this, the airport, they knew about that in 2017 and when the last time I went out to sample and I sampled this one house, three-month old baby, just beautiful, soft skin, smiling and laughing.

So, I'm sorry I get a little emotional when I do that and I shouldn't do that when I'm being filmed.

But no, I just wanna help people as much as possible.

- I think when our viewers see that piece and hear you talk, I think maybe some of the first questions they might have if they live in that general area is, "Hey, is it too late to get my well tested?

Like, is it too late for your study?"

What is something they can do?

- Yeah.

So yeah, we're wrapping up.

Ecology was nice enough to give us another summer to sample and so that was what you guys were able to film there.

And so, we were able to kinda find some areas where we had data gaps and fill those data gaps in and sample where we knew there was gonna be contamination.

But now we have used up those grant money for sampling.

So, at this point in time, I know we're trying to strive for a federal or a state or even like a PLP to pay for sampling, but to my knowledge, there's not a way to get paid for.

Anatek is awesome to work with.

They've lowered their price at I believe to 350, but that's still $350.

There's a non-accredited version Cyclopure where you can take a sample and send it into their lab.

They're not accredited but from what I've heard, there are results that are coming back that seem like they would be expected.

- They're in line with, yes.

- [Barb] They're cheaper.

- $79 I believe- - Okay.

- Was the last time.

- Good information.

- And you just go to Cyclopure online.

- [Dana] Okay.

- And here's one of the ways to think about that invisible contamination in your water.

We've mentioned that four parts per trillion is now both the state and the federal standard for the first chemical that's PFOA.

But it's hard to know what a part per trillion is.

So try this, four parts per trillion is like 4/10 of a cent in a billion dollars.

That's what parts per trillion is about.

So it's unimaginable.

But we're glad to know that the scientists have figured out how to find it.

They can detect, Chad detects four cents in a billion dollars.

And the granulated charcoal filters that are in use in the Air Force systems are really good at taking it out.

And it's the same charcoal that's in your aquarium, air filter, and in your filter cigarettes.

So it's not a new technology, it's just the application of a simple thing to removing a tiny, tiny thing out of drinking water at my house.

So, the solutions are clear but the vigor to solve the problem for everybody is what we're all trying to find.

- We wanna talk a little bit more about the Department of Ecology issuing an enforcement order for the airport in 2024.

Kind of explain what that means, what that means for the airport, and also just the progress of the study and the situation.

- Yeah, so an enforcement order is essentially a tool that we use to process through the cleanup process.

So, it is a roadmap essentially, and it provides a scope of work.

So, what they need to complete and a schedule.

And so, we follow this through the process and the airport at this time are required to do a remedial investigation, which essentially determines where the contamination is and how far it goes.

So both the lateral extent and the horizontal extent.

So, we're starting that process currently.

Also in the EO is a feasibility study.

So that will be looking at all the different cleanup options to evaluate which one is the most feasible.

So, currently we're working with the airport and they're working on kind of their pre-step to the remedial investigation.

So they're gathering data on site in terms of their soil and their groundwater.

- The public might ask why this didn't happen sooner.

You know, in 2024 it had been seven years.

Is this just all a process or why didn't we have an enforcement order of some kind earlier on?

- Good question.

So, it wasn't until 2021 that PFAS was designated as a hazardous substance in the state of Washington.

That allowed us under our Model Toxics Control Act or MTCA to have enforcement authority for the airport.

The airport is actually one of the first sites that we started in this process 'cause it is an emerging contaminant.

And again, it was a little bit of a citizen initiative that helped bring it to our attention and we kinda took it from there.

- All right.

Well, I chatted with airport leadership about the work they are doing for this enforcement order.

Here's another segment from our interview.

- Over this last year and a half, we've been diligently working with Kenia and her group at GSI.

They are a nationally recognized firm that works in PFAS working on to identify where does PFAS show up on the airport.

That's the first step.

There were the three locations that based off sampling of soil and water.

The two firefighting locations are our facilities there and then a joint training facility that dates back to the pre-military operation use of that.

- In terms of the challenges, so, we work on other airport sites.

And so, the first thing is just doing work and environmental work and collecting samples at a functioning commercial airport, right?

So, you have all the health and safety concerns.

You're at a functioning airport, you have a lot of right of ways, you need a lot of permissions.

So every time we are going out to sample, there is a list of things that we need to accommodate that differ because this is an airport.

We have started collecting those samples, we do need to get them analyzed.

That data also needs to go through a validation process.

It follows the validation process that the Department of Defense uses.

So that kind of adds an extra layer of getting from the point of taking a soil and groundwater sample to having a final result.

And then of course, once you have that final result, we need to analyze it.

- While we have a long ways to go under that enforcement order, it does provide and give the opportunity to our community to look at that information in a very scientific data-driven approach and comprehensive layout of what we have to do.

- We are not going to speculate.

We're not going to guess at what it is.

We're not going to build high hopes or expectations within the public.

We are very committed to giving them the data that we have that is valid going forward.

We really feel strongly about the integrity of the process that we go through and we're really committed to that.

That's our public's charge.

When you hold the public trust, you need to maintain that.

- It was just last month that the Department of Ecology notified the city of Spokane and the county that they are also responsible for this investigation and clean up around the airport.

Is that because they are technically the owners?

What does that mean?

- Yes, so the ecology listed both the city of Spokane and Spokane County as potentially liable persons.

And this is due in fact to the fact that they are owners that makes them liable for the site.

Moving forward, we did establish them as PLPs through our kind of 30-day process as of last June.

And we're currently working with project coordinators in each group to kind of further our investigation with the EO.

We plan to have them as active partners, especially as we try and look at the accessibility and the implementation of any off property impacts.

So, just of today we finalized a date to meet and have our kind of first sit down with all parties.

So that includes the airport, Ecology, the county, and the city.

- [Dana] All right.

So movement is happening.

- Movement is happening.

- All right.

Mark, to you, Fairchild is a little bit ahead in this progress.

I believe the contamination was found quicker or ahead of when the airport found theirs.

What are the next steps then in the process you're in?

- Yeah, so right now we've taken early actions.

Now we're in this remedial investigation phase.

This is where we're gonna define the entire nature and extent of contamination.

We've been through what we call, we're gonna go through phases and there's gonna be several phases to get us to this, an understanding of how deep has it gone.

You know, where is it going within these channels?

And determining this nature extent is a pretty big deal and how fast is it moving?

You determine all that in this and then, and that's what we're doing right now.

It may take us several phases to do that and it may take several years to get through that process.

And then we would follow the process, just like Brie said, is that we would come up with a vast, you know, what are all the possibilities out there that we could clean this material up for the situations that we have in soil, ground water, surface water, and even surface sediments that have PFAS contaminated things in them.

The Air Force right now we've got 43 different studies going on for remedial technologies that we're trying to understand, can we do this better and faster and what technologies can get rid of it as opposed to just take it from one place and put it to another.

So, there's a lot of things that are going on right now also.

But again, we are gonna follow that process as it's defined by our CERCLA laws.

- One of the ways, at least to help these folks who have contaminated wells, is this idea, and you mentioned it, filtration systems.

Barb, is there anything within the Department of Health that's helping homeowners receive these filtration systems?

We heard a little bit about what the Air Force is doing.

- Yeah, so for people who are not in the Air Force service area and are already getting a service, our department doesn't normally do this for private wells.

Our department is mostly focused on regulating water quality at public water systems.

But PFAS has really challenged us to move into those spaces that nobody's operating in.

And we saw a real equity issue for, we were giving people health advice to filter or get alternative water if their water's over a certain level, and only people who could afford to could follow our advice.

So, that's where we got a small pot of money from the legislature to work on this issue around the state and we are using that to offer free under the sink filters.

This is not the whole Cadillac system that Mark is talking about for, that's more of a permanent solution.

It's a stopgap measure instead of drinking bottled water or just drinking unfiltered water.

These under the sink filters will filter out the water that you use for most of your drinking and cooking.

So, it's a stopgap but it's, we feel like it's an important step to get people through the crisis part and to stop their exposure.

So, there's a couple of eligibility.

You have to be in one of two zip codes.

You have to have a water test showing that you're above the safety standards and we actually have coordinated with Brie's program.

So you just contact her program and then she calls our people and then we can schedule the person to come and install the system.

- But it's up to the homeowner to get that water tested first to determine the levels.

- They may already have their EPA test if they're in the West Plains or if their child test.

And so, if they already have that, that counts.

Or if they've sampled themselves.

- All right.

Well, in the last legislative session, Washington state granted Spokane County $7.5 million to provide some filtration systems.

Dr.

Velasquez, does your department have something to do with dispersing that money or is that what Barb was just talking about?

- So, as part of that disbursement, there was a recommendation of the creation of a regional task force that could provide guidance and advice to elected officials, both state, local, local state and federal.

So, we actually just had the first meeting of the PFAS Task Force.

I happened to be the co-chair for it.

And the goal is to determine, so what are the best ways to mitigate short-term the issues that we have, follow the science long-term.

What else can we do?

And identify all the funding mechanisms 'cause $7 1/2 million is not going to address the whole region.

- No.

- But the way I look at it, and I tend to be a realist but an optimist, this $7 1/2 million is basically proof of concept.

We can work together, come up with a recommendation, execute on providing many of those households with a point of entry system that will help filter the water, improve the point of that's effective while we study more and learn more, and ask for additional resource as we go forward.

- One of the questions that we might have and it might be different depending on the agency, but how many people in general, given the unique geology, given the flow of water to the northeast, it sounds like, from Fairchild and/or the airport, how many people do we think are affected?

And overall 'cause I know there's a lot that probably don't even know it yet.

People that live in maybe just on the outskirts of the affected area.

Do we have a rough number?

- Chad has tested 200 plus wells.

Fairchild has tested 400 private wells.

EPA with Brie tested 411.

So, we're around 1,100 wells that have received a test that we know about.

There may be another a hundred families who have put up their own money to Anatek Labs to get a test.

So, let's say 1,200 wells have some evidence.

But when we look at the whole population, there may be 3,000 wells overall.

And the coalition estimates that so far, the number of private well owners on the West Plains who know something about it and have taken some action, maybe no more than a quarter of all the people that live there.

- Wow.

- So, we're a long ways from thinking that we've ascertained the needs of the people.

Chad's working on the water that's all together under the ground.

But the health issue is individual families drinking from polluted wells on their own property.

And there's a long ways to go before we've been thorough in our medical health assistance to those 3,000 homeowners.

- The modeling helps too, but it's not just the airports that are contaminating the groundwater.

I mean, as you said, there's a lot of different places, especially automotive fluids we're starting to notice.

If you start to put the oils on gravel roads, sometimes that will seep into wells as well.

Septic systems are huge as well and that will pollute our own groundwater to some extent there too.

So, like we started off, say, "Oh, we're just gonna model it."

And then once we started actually looking into PFAS, the modeling is good but that modeling, if you don't know all the sources, you know, can't tell you where all the hotspots will be.

So that's where the sampling comes in.

And whereas even this summer we found new hotspots that we were not expecting to find.

- We wanna talk a little bit about the filtration system 'cause it sounds like at this point that's probably the best thing for a personal homeowner who's on a well, whether or not they have PFAS, you know, they've had the test yet.

Is there a filtration system that's best practices?

'Cause there's all kinds out there.

You hear the commercials on the radio.

I heard one coming in to the studio today.

Is there a particular kind of filtration system we should have as homeowners as it relates to PFAS or PFOS specifically?

- One of the recommendations that both Department of Health and Ecology has is that there's a third-party certification.

So, NSF is one of those third-party certification systems and if they'll usually list it on the filtration device or within the webpage of the filter company.

That lets you know that it has been tested and that it has been tested to meet our drinking water standards.

- I think it is important for people to know that not every water filter was designed to remove PFAS.

- Exactly.

- And we've seen people make the mistake of, and even some misleading claims on websites that didn't turn out to be true.

And so, we actually have two kind of fact sheets that are available on the main site and that kinda lead people through what are the different treatment technologies that they can consider and then what are some certified systems that they can pick from.

But every family, I mean some people might prefer like a pitcher style, some people might want it under the sink or even a refrigerator filter to filter the water coming into their fridge.

- That was gonna bring me to my next question.

I think so many people are probably asking themselves, well, I've got a filtration in my refrigerator.

Is that doing the trick?

I only drink the water out of my refrigerator.

Is that filter catching this?

And same with the, I won't use the name brand, but there's a very familiar picture.

- Brita?

- Brita.

But you know, are those very common filtration systems basic filters working on this chemical?

- Yeah, so, if you look at what is certified, refrigerator filters aren't going to be in the category 'cause they don't have a sufficient contact time to remove these very, very trace contaminants.

- Okay.

- So often we do want kind of larger systems, but that comes with drawbacks such as decreased flow or more contact time.

There are picture filters that we provided with the Alternative Drinking Water Fund through DOH to as kind of that temporary stopgap that Barb mentioned.

And so, you can get a regular filter that you can put in your fridge if you're concerned about PFAS in your water.

A lot of the commercial filters though are actually built for basically polished water.

So something that goes through our treatment processes.

Not ground water, which has an additional component of different minerals that are kind of in it and that can foul quite a few of these different filter and systems.

- And groundwater is what every home with a well that's essentially what what they're using.

- Yes.

- Yeah.

We are really focused obviously on the West Plains here because that is the major problem area in this region that we've discussed a lot.

How worried should people be if they don't live in this area, but they're worried about being contaminated with PFAS?

How worried should the general population say in the Spokane region be?

- I think your question is getting at what about other sources of PFAS exposure not water?

If you do live outside of the West Plains area, you can go on to our public facing dashboard, which has the results for all the public water systems that have tested.

So, aside from water, I think most of our exposure to PFAS comes through consumer products at this point.

It's in our shampoo, it's in our cosmetics, it's in stain remover.

- Cell phone I've heard, there's chemical compounds.

- Well, yeah.

The hard casing could have PFAS.

Even the same with a Teflon pan.

I mean, that's a hard surface, if it's scratched and it's degrading, yes, you could get a little bit of PFAS in your food.

But the big ticket items are those cleaning products, things that you put directly on your skin.

Ski waxes, there's all kinds, waxes and polishes.

Yeah, so.

- I was gonna say, does anybody else wanna add to this?

- Yeah.

- At the car wash where you drive through.

- [Dana] Yeah.

- You're given an option to upgrade for seven bucks and get the stuff that's works down that makes the water beat up on your car.

That's a PFAS ingredient that causes it to do that.

And so, the next time you're at the car wash- - Don't.

- Just think about that stuff that's coming down on you car.

- Maybe don't get the wax is what you're saying at the end.

- You get to decide whether, and your car looks nice and your shoes look nice, and it's a whole set of terrific products that are all indestructible.

That's what makes the firefighting foam work, it doesn't burn, it's what makes your Teflon pan work, it doesn't burn.

So it's the indestructible nature of these chemicals that leads to the name Forever Chemical.

- There is a lot of our viewing public that would say, you know, gosh, this is really complicated.

Is there any takeaways, just basic takeaways, that you, any of you would like to say to kind of wrap up this discussion that really could impact someone at home who's a little bit scared right now?

- So the first thing I will tell the audience is make sure that you learn.

Educate yourself.

That's number one.

Second, we haven't talked about disposal of the filters, which can be an issue.

So I just wanna highlight that from a public health perspective.

If you have one of the filtration systems, well, the filter doesn't go in the trash, doesn't go in the ground, doesn't go in the backyard.

There are sites that you can bring that in Spokane County for appropriate disposal.

- Can you take that to a transfer station?

- Transfer station there's one in Colbert, there is one in Geiger, there's one on Sullivan.

And then last but not least, if you have any health concerns, make sure you're talking to your provider about how do things impact or don't impact you and what is the best way for you to mitigate any risk factors or health concerns that you might have going forward.

Those are my three pieces of advice for everybody.

- Good information.

John, did you have something?

- It feels like now the neighbors on the West Plains who have learned about PFAS are being taken seriously by these agencies, by the elected officials.

And so that the activism of individual people counts in our experience and we encourage people.

Once they start to know, start to talk and talk with your family, talk with your physician, talk with your neighbors, talk with your elected officials, because it's gonna take everybody to get this fixed.

- There's strength in numbers in this particular case.

- And then what we also didn't really have a chance to mention is that, yes, we're learning more about the health effects, but we're also learning brand new techniques for filtering PFAS out and destroying that particle to break it apart.

So, there is a bright future.

I mean, there was a newspaper article about different bacteria that will actually break it apart.

- Wow.

- Sea-Tac Airport, they say they've taken out 95 or 98% of the PFAS from their water at the airport itself.

I mean, there is a bright future.

We just have to know where it is and be educated and want to change.

- I think that information is so valuable and to end on a up note that there is study and there is hopefully an answer and a solution to this long-term.

We're out of time.

Super informative conversation.

I wanna thank all of you for coming.

This is not an easy topic.

It's a very complex topic and I appreciate you guys boiling this down for our viewers so that everybody can understand their own personal exposure or risk, as well as the global risk as well.

So thank you all for coming.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Visit our website, ksps.org to find links to the resources we discussed during today's program.

We also have a blog with news updates related to the issues we talk about here.

Plus the At Issue podcast, another way for you to go beyond the headlines to hear from the people in organizations whose decisions shape your community.

Listen at ksps.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Thank you all for joining us on this episode of At Issue.

We hope to see you next time for more local voices and real conversations.