Missouri has several areas so contaminated that it will take massive amounts of federal money to clean them up. But it might take years to get those sites cleaned up. The addition of a long-abandoned lead mine in Iron County gives Missouri 26 superfund sites – sites so badly contaminated that private owners and the state can’t raise enough money to set them right. But the federal tax that underwrote the superfund program expired more than eight years ago. The state’s superfund section chief, Dennis Stinson, says projects now have to wait until Congress getsaround to approprating money. But if there’s an imminent health danger, some money can be freed up to help. The state often has to pay a percentage of the costs, and with the budgets being close for a few years, the state participation has been limited. A special legislative committee is looking into ways the state can financeits share of major clean-up projects coming up in a few years in southwest Missouri.
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