By now you’ve probably heard the news. The City of Tacoma, full of dreams of wooing Russell into staying in town, recently agreed to acquire the old Sauro’s Cleanerama site along Pacific Avenue. The Tacoma City Council voted Tuesday, Sept 23 to execute a sale agreement that will have the Sauro family deed the land — which is highly contaminated thanks to years of dumping the carcinogen perchlorethylene (or perc) into the ground and is valued at approximately $600,000 — to Tacoma, and also require the Sauros to pay $550,000 to help with the expected $2.7 million on-site cleanup cost. 

 

In the world of business, much has been made of this deal. Across the board those who drool over things like Tacoma’s much promised and never ending economic revitalization — and have cold-sweat nightmares about the thought of Russell ditching the City of Destiny for Seattle — have applauded the pact. From what I understand, a clean Sauro site — and by site I mean the four block area that surrounds the old dry cleaner and is rich with deadly perc — will allow some ridiculously rich guy from Germany to purchase a parking lot and in turn offer that parking lot along with other property he owns up to Russell as a possible site for the investment firm’s new headquarters. 

This, people tell me, is a good deal for Tacoma. I have no reason to doubt that.

But, while plenty has been made about the obvious economic benefits for Tacoma in cleaning up the old Sauro site, much less has been made about the highly toxic perc in the ground that’s at the root of all this.

 

When Sauro’s Cleanerama was allowing perc — an extremely common dry cleaning agent even today — to be poured into a hole in the ground and forgotten, it was a common practice. It wasn’t until years later that health officials and scientists began to realize perc’s possible health and environmental risks. In humans perc is known to lead to nervous system issues, kidney and liver problems, skin irritation, cancer, and possible death. In the environment, perc can contribute to photochemical smog and leach into ground water — as it has at the old Sauro site. 

Today we know better, right? Well, kind of. You can no longer dump perc into a hole in the ground, but that doesn’t prevent a huge majority of dry cleaners in our area from still using the cancer causing agent — even though safer alternatives are readily available. Last time I checked people still worked at dry cleaners, and lived near them, which means innocent folks everywhere still face considerable health risks thanks to an outdated chemical used to get fancy clothes clean.

Think about that next time you take your slacks to the cleaner. And definitely think about when you see the Department of Ecology’s Marv Coleman leading the massive cleanup at the old Sauro’s Cleanerama — which will include constant air monitoring and require cleanup workers to undergo 40 hours of hazardous material training and wear special protective equipment.   

“Anytime we do a cleanup we have a health and safety plan,” says Coleman. 

That’s a good thing. Dry cleaners — not just ones long gone — should take note.