By Barbara Augsdorfer, Editor for the Effingham Herald
A small but vocal group of Effingham County residents – mostly from the neighborhoods surrounding the DRT plant in Springfield – met Feb. 29 in the social hall of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Rincon. The purpose of the meeting was to hear from county officials and any updates regarding the odor in Ebenezer, that residents claim is coming from DRT. A new complaint from residents now includes banging and other noises coming from the industrial park in the early hours of the morning.
Residents don’t like being awakened by the smell…and now the noise.
About 20 residents attended the town hall, with Springfield Mayor Bart Alderman, Springfield City Manager Matt Morris, County Commissioner Jamie DeLoach, and Effingham County Fire Chief Clint Hodges on the panel. Rincon Mayor Ken Lee and Rincon Councilmember Ben Blackwell were in the audience.
The city and council officials again updated the residents saying they’re still in a wait-and-see mode since the EPA and EPD have not concluded analyzing the data collected during the first two weeks of February.
Replying to citizens’ concerns regarding safety from fires and chemical spills, Hodges said, “We do have a fire inspector (Liz Sapp). She started several months ago. She went in one for the first time, a warehouse, (and) found a large number of safety violations. It was immediately addressed.”
Sapp does not work alone. According to the Effingham County website, Sapp is part of “Inspection Services” with Effingham County Fire, which includes a building official, building inspector I and II, and a plan review/lead inspector.
“We are a Class Three fire department, which is commercial grade, which is very good,” Hodges responded.
“Fire departments are rated from a one up to a 10, (with) 10 being the worst,” DeLoach explained. “Three years ago, we finally got a Class Three commercial grade rating, which is really good. We were a four for a long time.
“City of Savannah is a Class One, so they are a lot better, but they are a lot bigger than we are (with) staff (and) equipment. But what I always tell people with public safety, I'm a big proponent of it. I don't think you could ever spend too much money on public safety,” DeLoach added.
Hodges delineated a few of the incidents that Rincon Fire and Effingham County Fire responded to at the DRT plant as far back as 2019, raising concerns from the audience that some of those incidents were not listed with the EPA or OSHA.
“Everything has to flow through EPA and EPD,” DeLoach answered.
DeLoach explained to the group that concerns such as dealing with odors or noise, have to be handled a certain way. And they may not be happy with the process.
“The EPA and the EPD are here on a regular basis,” DeLoach said. He added that County Manager Tim Callanan had a meeting with the deputy director of the EPD during Effingham County Day at the Capitol in February.
“We can’t put our residents at risk of lawsuits,” DeLoach explained. “There are certain processes and ways we have to do things (when handling issues such as DRT) It’s a quality-of-life issue. I never got any complaints before they (DRT) got here.”
In DRT’s defense, DeLoach said that since the company had a merger and leadership change about a year ago, “I’ve been involved with the conversations, there have been more conversations with the new leadership than I remember ever being before.” He added that DRT is making a change with their wastewater process and “EPD has been looking over that process every step of the way.”
DeLoach went on to say he is not sure if these fixes will solve the problem, but that DRT volunteered to go this route and it’s a six-to-eight-week process.
“They are not at the end of that time period, yet. I know it’s no guarantee, but they are making some changes on their own,” DeLoach added. “And I know it's because of the pressure they're feeling from the community. I don't think they would have just volunteered (to do) that.”
DeLoach added that the county is looking to beef up its nuisance ordinance.
Morris piggy backed on DeLoach’s theme of continuing the process through legal channels without rashly threatening or filing lawsuits.
“We are not going anywhere. I don't want to smell it any more than any of you do,” Morris said. “We are going to continue to fight this fight as hard as we can for as long as we have to. It will be a long and laborious process to put an end to this. That's just the reality of it.
“I can't come up here and give you good news tonight, (such as) ‘we're going to shut their water off and we're going to deal with $100 million lawsuit.’ That wouldn't be good for anyone. Yes, we have had to somewhat play nice in the sense that we send them letters from our attorney, and they took action. That is as amicable as it can get.”
DRT issued a response to the meeting
DRT issued this statement regarding the Feb. 29 meeting on March 1. “We take this matter very seriously and are committed to being good neighbors. After all, our employees live and work in the area as well and we are part of the community. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) have monitored our plant and the surrounding area on a regular basis and have not identified any health concerns to date.
DRT remains committed to being transparent and open. For the latest updates, please go to GetToKnowDRT.com. Our last update was on 2/29/24-see link: https://gettoknowdrt.com/2024/02/29/drt-america-maintenance-notice-2/
If anyone has any questions/concerns or wishes to report an odor, please contact DRT via email at drtspringfield@gmail.com.”
The Herald reached out to DRT for additional comments on March 4, and is still awaiting a response. That response will be posted here when it is received.
