GREENSBORO, N.C. — Greensboro now has a plan to deal with a problematic park.
City council voted Tuesday to cover the soil at Bingham Park, rather than remove it.
This decision is years in the making. More than a decade ago, the city learned Bingham Park was on the site of a former landfill and incinerator.
Around 2010 testing revealed toxins were present.
Earlier this year, Greensboro Parks and Rec closed the park after learning lead, iron, and arsenic were in the soil.
Ever since they’ve worked with the community to come up with a way to clean up the site.
A fence runs around Bingham Park to protect the public as its future has taken more than a decade to get sorted out by the city.
After getting community input Parks and Rec came up with 2 options.
Option A is a $12.4 million plan to cover the contaminated soil at the park but remove the soil at the former Hampton Elementary site which is also particularly contaminated. A neighborhood park would be built at the school site.
Parks and rec said this would be a permanent solution while the community sees it as a Band-Aid.
“It is not simply cap and waste and walk away leaving hazardous material buried without a permanent and safe solution only perpetuates harm," said a resident at the council meeting. "This is a community already struggling with the challenges of environmental racism. Why should they bear the burden of a century of injustice?"
"We deserve better. My children deserve better. I want my children and all the children in the community to have a safe place where they can come together play freely and create cherished memories without the fear of dangers lurking beneath their feet," Another resident said.
Kobe Riley, the deputy director with Parks and Rec, said option A is restrictive only allowing for a nature trail at Bingham.
"We can't add amenities that the communities have asked for because the anchoring in the coverage isn’t able to penetrate the ground within 12 inches," Riley said.
Option B is a more than $40 million remediation plan where soil is fully removed at both locations and taken to a Landfill.
A park would then be built at Bingham.
Most residents were in favor.
"Supporting full remediation you can add to the legacy of Greensboro and the long fight for civil rights," one resident said. "I hope you stand on the right side of history and adopt option B."
City council members' biggest concern was finding funding for option B.
So they went with option A because they have $18 million ready to use right now.
It passed with a 6 to 2 vote.
Residents who spoke were disappointed, saying this decision was bigger than removing soil but about justice and doing what is morally right.
The remediation process will take at least 14 months.