Today, the Lake County Health Department announced the conclusion of the third phase of air monitoring for ethylene oxide (EtO). This testing has identified concentrations of EtO that concern me. Now that we have ample outdoor air monitoring data - more than 600 samples - I urge the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) to conduct the health risk assessment in a timely manner that was promised to us. I also request that once complete, that ATSDR and USEPA communicate the findings directly to our Lake County community.
I am proud of our leadership and partnership between Lake County, the City of Waukegan, and the Village of Gurnee, who listened to our community, implemented and funded the first phase of air monitoring and conducted the phase two and phase three air monitoring over the last eighteen months. We appreciate that after our first phase of testing, the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (IEPA) saw fit to fund the second and third phases of testing.
I want to thank State Senator Melinda Bush and State Representative Joyce Mason for their work and leadership on this issue. Illinois now has the most stringent EtO emission laws in the nation.
Lake County, Waukegan, Gurnee and our local representatives stepped up and got the ball moving to conduct outdoor air monitoring to assess community exposure to EtO. We now ask our federal partners to do their part and analyze our air monitoring results, assess and quantify the risk to our Lake County residents and directly provide answers to this ongoing community health concern.
Sandy Hart
Lake County Board Chair