If your home is served by the City of Hastings water utility, an important meeting is being held Thursday, May 9 at 6 p.m. at Hastings High School. Attendees are asked to park in the lower-level parking lot.
On the agenda is a public meeting on Hastings drinking water and PFAS contaminants in it. The agenda will include an information session, followed by a question-and-answer session. Presentations by Minnesota Department of Health, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and City of Hastings will include recent water testing results, impacts of PFAS, updates on the investigations for sources of PFAS in the region, and project details for water treatment plants.
The meeting follows a recent public notice to the community about new EPA maximum contaminant levels for safe drinking water. Five of six wells in Hastings have PFAS contaminant levels above the allowed levels.
Hastings has been working diligently to find a solution to the PFAS contamination. It is finalizing plans for three water treatment plants that will connect with the six city wells and the Hastings Veterans Home to filter out PFAS and nitrates.
City Public Works Director/Engineer Ryan Stempski has been on the front lines of the Hastings fight against PFAS. While the solution is building the treatment plants, they carry a heavy price tag that the city’s budget won’t support. State law mandates that the drinking water supply has to have contamination levels at acceptable standards within five years. The cost for building the three treatment plants is in the neighborhood of $69 million, plus up to $1 million a year to operate them.
Hastings has been on the offensive in seeking funding. It is seeking inclusion in the East Metro 3M Settlement which has funded PFAS contamination from waste disposal at 3M facilities in Cottage Grove, Woodbury, Oakdale and the Washington County Landfill. The city is working with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to trace the source of the city’s problem, and there is the presence of 3M chemical compounds in Hastings’ water supply.
Stempski said the city is working to have finalized plans for its first water treatment plant ready by late summer. The cost has been estimated in the range of $20 million. He was asked if the financial picture will come together for Hastings in time.
“That’s the magic question, isn’t it,” he replied.
The city has requested funding from the Minnesota Legislature. Its session ends in mid-May, and a state bonding bill is the last thing it votes on. Stempski, Mayor Mary Fasbender and State Rep. Shane Hudella testified last month before a House committee on the need for funding help.
The city also has sought funding through Gov. Tim Walz and through federal grant programs.
Stempski thinks help will be on its way.
“Hastings is positioned really well. We’ve already received a $3.2 million grant to complete the (treatment plant) design. We have been successful in some funding already. I think we have a very good story with these contaminants not being from Hastings and being from other responsible parties,” he said. “Money’s tight up at the Capitol. We know that. Are we going to have a bonding bill this year? I don’t know. If we do, I’m hopeful that we have a piece of it.”
MPCA is sampling Hastings wells and has ordered 3M to map its discharge. Stempski said there are fault lines under the Mississippi River.
“We continue to work with MPCA on our environmental studies, because there could be a way in which we get pulled into the East Metro settlement, which has dollars that are already available. We’re kind of working all of those angles. And I would argue that we have a very good story, and we should be included like other cities in the East Metro. It’s just a matter of time,” said Stempski. “I feel like we’ve put together a compelling argument, and we’ve been at hearings at the Capitol and made connections. We’re doing our best to position ourselves and will continue to do so even if we don’t get good news this session.”
While there are many companies that used products that contained PFAS, the proximity to the Cottage Grove 3M facility makes that the likely culprit.
“3M Cottage Grove make and disposed of PFAS products, so that’s logical. They’ve already kind of made the linkage that it’s the chemicals that they were getting rid of that are in the water,” said Stempski. “Something that we’ve already talked about is that we know there’s fault lines underneath the river. We know that. There are some proprietary products that are made at 3M Cottage Grove that we’ve found in one of our wells. There are some things that helped build that case that there is a connection, but I don’t think the state’s fully there yet. They’re continuing to study this and look at all scenarios so that they can put this all together based on science and geology.”
Stempski expects this to move quickly on the funding decision end this summer, either through the legislature, other grant sources or through the MPCA environmental studies.
“We’re hoping that we understand where things are at when we’re at a point in August where we have plans ready to bid our project of treatment plant number one and the connection to the Veterans Home. All that work should be ready to go,” Stempski said. “We have a little bit of time between now and then to learn and then brief the city council on our current funding status. We would have to make some hard decisions at that time. Obviously, it’s a lot easier if we’re fully funded. Then we move forward, but if we’re partially funded or not funded, that’s when the challenges come. We’ll just communicate that like we always have been and be transparent and see what our next steps are.”
“I think the summer will be very telling of where this will play out,” said Stempski.