[CPEO-MEF] Education department won't sponsor Coos Head transfer

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Oregon
THE WORLD LINK
Education department won't sponsor Coos Head transfer
By Andrew Sirocchi, Staff Writer
Thursday, June 12, 2003

The U.S. Department of Education won't provide educational institutions
the sponsorship they need to purchase the Coos Head Air National Guard
base near Charleston.

In an e-mail communication to the General Services Administration,
Barbara Shawyer, of the department's Federal Real Property Assistance
Program, said her agency is withdrawing its interest in the site due to
environmental contamination that permeates the groundwater at Coos Head.

"Our policy here at ED is not to convey contaminated property," Shawyer
wrote. "If we receive any expressions of interest for the property, we
will notify them of our policy and the fact that we cannot participate
in this disposal."

Coos Head, closed since 1996 when the Air National Guard moved its base
to Klamath Falls, has been contaminated by several benzene plumes that
entered the groundwater from leaking underground storage tanks once
operated by the military. Cleanup operations have been ongoing for
years, but four test wells continue to show the presence of high levels
of benzene, a component of gasoline. GSA property manager James
Biederman said the cleanup is expected to be complete by 2006, but the
Department of Education expressed its concern that the property transfer
would be ongoing prior to that date.

This article can be viewed at:
http://www.theworldlink.com/articles/2003/06/12/news/news01.txt

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