By Joe Reavis

Staff Writer

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An environmental cleanup effort at a former industrial site in Wylie is about halfway completed, which will free the property for future use.

The site is off FM 544 and is the former home of Chemical Recycling, Inc., which went out of business in the early 1980s, Assistant City Manger Jeff Butters said.

The city of Wylie is involved in the project to the extent that it foreclosed on the property for back taxes last month to allow the Environmental Protection Agency access to begin cleanup, Butters explained.

Pollution of the tract came about from a process by Chemical Recycling to treat old paint for use in asphalt paving, and the company had laid down a strip of treated paving at its processing facility, the assistant city manager said. However, it turned out that some of the paint used in the paving contained lead that is now in the soil, Butters noted.

The EPA got involved in the cleanup process in the early 1980s, Chemical Recycling went bankrupt and the land sat idle for four decades. The city did not foreclose during that time because it would have had to accept responsibility for the pollution and pay for mitigation.

For full story see The Wylie News at http://www.etypeservices.com/Wylie%20NewsID245/default.aspx