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Julie Jonas, Girdwood Action Team: Julie and several other parents in her small Alaska town organized to successfully remove an old, leaking waste dump located underneath the town's elementary school.

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Cleanup begins at old landfill near Girdwood school
by Gianna Trinca - July 10, 2002

Girdwood, Alaska - The much-needed cleanup at Girdwood Elementary School began Wednesday. Solid waste buried decades ago at a landfill near the school is being hauled away so students can play safely during recess.

It’s a day that’s been a year and a half in the making -- mounds of household garbage buried in the 1960s and ‘70s are being dug up and trucked away to Anchorage’s municipal landfill.

Parents who have children attending Girdwood Elementary are already breathing easier.

“It’s rewarding to see that, when you do work together, good things can happen,” said Julie Jonas of the Girdwood Action Team, which pushed for the cleanup.

Anchorage Solid Waste Services employees are finding garbage down as deep as 15 feet below the surface. “We found lots of old pull-top cans, bottles, wood debris, insulation,” said Keith Howard, who’s directing the cleanup.

The old Girdwood landfill closed almost 30 years ago, but a year and a half ago, a brown, gooey substance began oozing to the surface. It was then that parents started pushing for action.

The huge holes being left in the area are being filled with truckloads of gravel, and machines releasing tubes filled with fresh-scented oils are attempting to mask the garbage odor as the debris is hauled out.

Project workers expect the job to be done by the first day of school, Sept. 2. Until then, all the hiking and biking trails around the school will be closed to the public.

Some parents say they’re still worried that brown ooze seeped under the school building, where crews are not cleaning. Cleanup workers say they’ll wait to see if any seepage appears in that area before they take action.