With confirmed reports of contaminated

water leading into Lake Edith, the Fayette County Board of Health is seeking

assistance from state environmental officials.

The elevated counts of bacteria

recently discovered in a stream leading to Lake Edith have led the board

to desire action from the state. A likely source of the contamination

is sewage discharge from the Marnelle Mobile Home Park.

Lake Edith is next to the Fayette

Family YMCA camp, but YMCA officials have not allowed swimming or canoeing

there because of the contamination reports.

At a meeting Tuesday morning,

several Board of Health members said the stream at times has had a "sewage"

smell and foam has collected on the water. Jim Summerville of the Georgia

Environmental Protection Division told the board that concerns him and

any such reports should be forwarded to the EPD.

But Summerville said Marnelle

officials have not violated the law, because they have remained within

the parameters of their sewage discharge permit. Several unannounced inspections

at the mobile home park have netted no violations, Summerville said.

The board wants the state to

monitor chlorine output from Marnelle to make sure the park is using enough

chlorine to kill contaminants such as fecal coliform. A computer monitoring

device could be placed on the stream to do just that, eliminating the

need for field testing, but Summerville balked at using such a system,

saying such devices are typically reserved for large sewer treatment plants.

He said he will look into the matter, though.

The EPD could attempt to change

the permit to require a more stringent bacterial count limit on the operation,

Summerville said.

"Based on the YMCA using

the lake, we could consider that," he said, adding that if the EPD

does that, it wants to be on firm legal ground.

The contamination has been

substantiated by tests conducted at the board's request and tests from

a Tyrone company that is investigating whether it can help improve the

water quality discharged from the mobile home park. But the EPD requires

more tests that the board ordered to create a geometric mean, a method

of averaging test results. Sampling done by Archaea Solutions Inc. from

Tyrone tested for different coliforms than the state tests for.

Dennis Chase, a local environmental

activist, chastised the state for not taking stronger action, particularly

since the federal Environmental Protection Agency has said geometric means

aren't needed for these tests to confirm contamination.

Archaea Solutions offers a

treatment process that could likely keep Lake Edith free of bacteria for

"a very small cost," according to Dr. Ernest Childs, president

of the company.

Childs said the Marnelle treatment

facility also could be helped with better use of the chlorination process.

Summerville said the waste

treatment facility at Marnelle was built prior to 1974. He suggested several

changes that would improve the chlorination process at the facility.

No representatives from Marnelle

attended the meeting.

State Rep. Kathy Cox said there

have been several complaints from Marnelle residents that officials have

dumped raw sewage on the ground on several occasions. If the state law

isn't strong enough to force the problem to be fixed, she said she would

work to strengthen the laws.

"They are not properly

operating their system," Cox said.

Board member (and county commissioner)

A.G. VanLandingham said he felt it was unfair that the contamination from

Marnelle was preventing others from enjoying Lake Edith.

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