QU
Running on cork: Quinnipiac’s women’s soccer team.
A bid for a rubber college athletic field ran into interference in Hamden two weeks after a similar bid scored a goal of approval in New Haven.
The Hamden bid was pitched Wednesday night at the monthly meeting of the Hamden Inland Wetlands Commission.
Quinnipiac University made a pitch to replace the cork infill in its already synthetic playing field with a rubberized product called EPDM, which stands for ethylene propylene diene monomer rubber.
Sal Filardi, Quinnipiac University’s vice president for facilities and capital planning, said installing the rubber product would solve an ongoing problem of the current cork fill freezing on the field.
Since the cork was installed two years ago, teams have missed at least 25 days of practice, Filardi reported. One championship game was put in jeopardy when the field did not un-freeze from a cold night by afternoon game time.
The problem — as the commissioners portrayed it during a scientifically informed hour-long discussion at Hamden Town Hall — is that the EPDM contains harmful chemicals, albeit within an encapsulating polymer coating, as well as containing carbon black. Therefore, the commissioners argued, the product has the potential to endanger wetlands, ultimately threatening water quality in town.
Quinnipiac University’s Filardi: Rubber beats cork.
The field in question, North Field, has wetlands on at least two sides of the stadium, where soccer and lacrosse are played. The commissioners concluded that Filardi and the university’s attorney, Bernard Pellegrino, had not presented enough data and studies to convince them that potentially dangerous run-off might not occur, especially over time and under the full range of cold and hot weather conditions. So they voted unanimously to table the proposal pending the applicants’ submission of additional materials, including toxicology reports on the effects of the product on aquatic life, as well as real studies on how the several thousand fields are faring across the country where EPDM has been installed.
That action contrasted with the City Plan Commission of New Haven’s vote last month to permit Yale University to use EPDM at the Yale Bowl in a complete replacement of a grass field with synthetic turf. Some environmentalists in New Haven had raised objections to the Yale Bowl plan, raising concerns about the health of athletes coming into contact with toxic chemicals. In Hamden the concern was about toxic chemicals from the rubber turf leaching into the wetlands.
Because the QU presenters did not have the data, the Hamden tabling did not represent a judgement or an ultimate rejection of the proposal, although the volunteer commissioners, several of whom are environmental professionals, expressed skepticism. The university agreed to research answers to the commissioners’ questions and return at the next regular meeting, on Feb. 6.
After Wednesday night’s presentation, Filardi and Pellegrino were peppered with questions based on material they had submitted — and not submitted — to the commissioners in support of their application.
“I’ve read the toxicology report,” said Commissioner Tim Mack, “but what if it’s over a hundred degrees? Is that a problem?” he asked, in terms of chemical leaching out.
The response: “I don’t believe there have been reports about hot days. The fields are typically not used on the hottest days.”
That failed to reassure Mack, who said that he had found a field study, done in Berlin, Germany, over the range of cold to hot temperatures “that showed there were releases.”
Assistant Town Attorney Tim Lee asked Mack to submit that study to the town clerk.
As he stood and walked across the town legislative chamber, where the meeting was being conducted, Pellegrino asked Mack when the study was done. Mack paused and said, “2012.”
Mack also asked if QU might consider a more natural fill — olive stems.
QU attorney Bernard Pellegrino.
Filardi replied that olive stems and pits were too hard. The rubberized quality of EPDM was needed to provide the safety-enhancing padding for the field, he said.
Mack put the question simply: “Do we know EPDM won’t hurt the wetlands?”
Filardi: “It’s an environmentally sensitive rubber,” better than the “crumb” rubber product that the commission rejected in an initial hearing in 2015, which led the university to choose the now troublesome cork infill.
Commissioner Kirk Shadle, who teaches high school environmental studies in Bridgeport and is an adjunct professor in the field at University of Connecticut, asked about possible aquatic toxicology reports. Pellegrino said he had never seen an aquatic toxicology report related to EPDM, but he would look for one.
Pellegrino noted that thousands of fields across the country have EPDM. Commissioner George Schneider and Commission Chair Joan Lakin — who before her retirement was a water pollution control executive in several area towns — asked him if anyone has studies on wetland sensitivities in any of these locales.
“That would be important for us to know,” Lakin said. “Specifically durability, degradation, leaching over time.”
Commissioner Lewis Beilman said he plays soccer on the field and comes away often with particles of the current infill in shoes. He asked Filardi to clarify how close the field is to wetlands.
In two directions, wetlands are 25 feet away, demarcated by a fence. Filardi responded. On a third side, facing a road, most of the drainage from the field goes into a culvert, which runs into grasses and other filters for cleansing.
Hamden Inland Wetlands Enforcement Officer Tom Vocelli said clarifying how the drainage works is more germane than any fencing to being comfortable with the proposal.
Commission Chair Joan Lakin and Commissioner Kirk Shadle.
At the end of an hour, Schneider made the motion to table the request to approve EPDM “pending receipt of more timely information on material properties and the effect on the wetlands.” All nine of the commissioners present voting for the motion.
To get a clearer understanding, the commissioners also agreed to arrange a formal group site walking tour of the area, with Filardi, before the next meeting. The date of the site visit is yet to be determined.
Filardi said he was not surprised by the delay. “We’d be surprised if they approved,” he said.
Lakin said interested members of the public are free to join the commissioners’ on-site inspection.
No members of the public were in attendance at the meeting. Had they been, they could not have participated — beyond listening — unless they had petitioned the commission formally to make remarks.