Residents of Franklin have started to question the causes of their auto-immune disorders or worry about an increased number of children at one school being diagnosed with diabetes.
The worry has crept into their head: Could conditions or diseases previously thought to be caused by genetics or a virus instead be the result of contamination at industrial sites in Franklin?
Dozens of residents spoke at a community meeting on Friday night, criticizing state officials for not doing enough in the past to have sites cleaned up and asking them to test locations around the city, including all the Franklin schools and inside homes.
They are also questioning the state’s registry of cancer patients and any problems caused by former water well fields that are no longer in use.
The If It Was Your Child group, formed by parents who had children with cancer, has been searching for the cause of an increased rate of pediatric cancer cases in Franklin. The group raised money to pay for testing of 14 homes in Franklin.
State officials have asked for the addresses of the homes, but that information has not been released. Their review of the private firm’s report showed that 12 of the 14 homes had no measurable amount or lower than allowed levels of PCE and TCE, which are volatile organic compounds, and IDEM is offering to conduct its own test at two of the homes.
One concern is that the detectable levels in one of the homes were found in the kitchen, where cleaners are likely to be stored. Household cleaners can contain volatile organic compounds.
Matt Davidson, the father of a child with cancer, said he didn’t want to hear state officials discredit the study that the group had raised money to fund.
Some residents said they felt the Indiana Department of Environmental Management and the Department of Health commissioners’ statements of concern and commitment to continue investigating and testing were not sincere.
One man said their apologies for the suffering of Franklin families was disingenuous, that officials had done their best not to answer questions and had only provided vague answers.
Both commissioners said repeatedly that they were continuing their work, were committed to Franklin, had been in the city with their staffs multiple times to gather information, and that if there is a problem, they would find it. They also repeatedly offered support to families who were struggling will illnesses or cancers, or who had lost a loved one, and pledged to do everything they could. They said they came to Franklin to learn about residents’ concerns, and include those concerns in their action plans.
The concern is centered on two industrial sites in Franklin that state and federal officials have been monitoring for years due to contamination on the property. Soil has been excavated, water treated on site and testing done to make sure the clean-up is working, and that no contamination has leaked off-site, state officials said.
But the residents who spoke at the meeting are not convinced and want to know what else is being done. One woman who lives on King Street, in the area next planned for road reconstruction, asked for testing to be done inside her home now, during and after construction because soil disruption could allow dangerous compounds to seep inside her home, through unsealed doors or windows.
The If It Was Your Child group is continuing to hone in on having Franklin defined as a cancer cluster, and say they’ve gathered data that the state doesn’t have, and that the state department of health has been unresponsive. State officials said that by law, doctors must report all cancer diagnosis, but that a cancer cluster is not defined solely by a number of cases.
A woman whose family has lived in Franklin for 60 years said that four family members have battled cancer or auto-immune disorders, and she came to the meeting to ask for transparency, answers, honesty and a fix for her city.
Another woman said her home on Hamilton Avenue repeatedly flooded, and she suffered from narcolepsy, epilepsy and other conditions. Her son had mononucleosis twice. Once they moved to Greenwood, her epilepsy condition immediately resolved, she said.
One woman questioned the impacts of previous water sources for Franklin residents that were closed in the past decade.
Two of the Webb water wellfields were closed in 2007 after levels the contaminant dichloroethene (DCE) were detected, even though the levels were well below minimum standards, Indiana Department of Environmental Management Commissioner Bruno Pigott said.
The third well field contained no contaminants, but was taken out of service in 2013, he said.
