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Environmental update: one new PFAS detect reported and new home‑gardening guidance released
Summary
The Board of Health received its monthly contamination update: most recent sampling produced one new sample just above the state standard on Cato Lane, while most other samples were nondetect; staff previewed two new fact sheets on PFAS health effects and home gardening guidance and said routine soil or irrigation testing is not currently recommended.
Andrew Shapiro, the town’s environmental contamination administrator, presented the Board of Health’s March data update on PFAS and related communications materials.
Shapiro said the department reported 10 new samples this month; ‘‘most importantly, we have a new detect just above the state standard on Cato Lane,’’ he said, and noted that all other samples in the reporting period were nondetect. He described the dataset as large and incremental and said the recent additions do not change the overall distribution of results.
Shapiro previewed two fact sheets. The first summarizes the health effects of PFAS and restates guidance from earlier expert presentations; the second provides practical, precautionary gardening tips for residents, emphasizing measures such as using rain barrels for irrigation if PFAS are known in well water, wearing gloves and washing produce to reduce soil/dust transfer, and using raised beds with clean soil. He said the town is not recommending routine PFAS sampling of irrigation wells or soil at this time, noting that soil testing is more complicated than water sampling and that commercial soil products are not routinely tested for PFAS.
When the chair asked about a statistic in the fact sheet, Shapiro confirmed that ‘‘98 percent of all Americans have PFAS in their blood’’ and added that a smaller subset (he described it as the ‘‘upper risk threshold’’) accounts for a higher exposure group for whom additional precautions are more important.
Residents raised questions about whether the town should begin testing for micro‑ and nanoplastics and about child exposure to contaminated fields and dust; Shapiro said micro/nanoplastics testing and standards are less developed than PFAS and merit future consideration, but there are no current town testing plans.
Why it matters: the update flags a single new detect above the state standard and introduces practical guidance for residents who garden; it also reiterates that while PFAS exposures are widespread, targeted steps can reduce additional exposure.
What’s next: the department will publish the fact sheets on the town website and pursue additional communications as the sampling season increases in spring and summer.
