Nor did it notify residents that their drinking wells could be contaminated with dry cleaning chemicals, known as perchloroethylene, so they could test the water themselves.
Kwik Shop knew it.” It had happened at least once before, at a dry cleaning site near Central and Tyler in Wichita, where the state waited more than four years between discovering contamination nearby and notifying residents of more than 200 homes.
Kansans aren’t required to use city water if they already have a well, and some Wichita neighborhoods still rely on private well water.
The Hufmans’ well had 49 parts per billion of PCE in it, nearly 10 times the allowed level.
About 400 dry cleaning facilities have registered with Kansas since the Dry Cleaning Trust Fund was created.
The KDHE says it didn’t have the money to deal with the site until the Environmental Protection Agency provided funding in 2013.
About 70,000 private drinking water wells are recorded with the state.
There have been other sites in the dry cleaning program where people were drinking contaminated water.
The 2016 legislative report about the fund says the KDHE had to shut down most work on cleaning up sites, due to money.
“The water would have been cleared up of bacteria, but they would’ve been drinking contaminated water,” Holt said.