Lisa Arkin: Another dioxin devastation for a local Eugene neighborhood

Presenter: Through Dec. 11, you’re invited to share your comments about a proposed cleanup plan for Trainsong Park. Here to help bring you up to speed is longtime environmental justice advocate Lisa Arkin:

Lisa Arkin: The title of my essay is ‘Another dioxin devastation for a local Eugene neighborhood.’

First it was Bethel Neighbors dealing with the J.H. Baxter dioxin scandal. Now it’s Trainsong Neighbors facing a massive dioxin pollution cleanup.

In 2021 and 2022, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality discovered massive toxic contamination—high levels of dioxin—in areas where children play in Eugene’s Trainsong Park.

Dioxin is a pollutant known for its association with Agent Orange, a chemical used throughout the Vietnam War.

Finding so much dioxin pollution was shocking enough to convince regulators to do additional soil depth testing in 2025. Those results revealed that contamination was much deeper and extensive than originally understood.

High levels of contamination extend as deep as two feet below the soil surface in a number of places in the park, and perhaps even deeper.

Dioxin causes cancer. Dioxin causes serious harm to reproductive organs. Dioxin is threatening the health of residents in Eugene’s Trainsong neighborhood, and all the families who use Trainsong Park’s playgrounds, walking paths, baseball facilities, basketball courts, the skate park, the grass fields, picnic tables, and landscaped areas.

This is a popular park. Before the park was partially closed, the city’s ‘Fun For All’ program and Oregon Department of Education’s summer food service program operated in Trainsong Park.

The city of Eugene owns the public land on which Trainsong Park sits. That means that our city is responsible by law for protecting us from the serious health harms associated with the park’s highly contaminated soils.

From this legal requirement, the city of Eugene is holding an open public comment period to gather reactions to their proposed cleanup plan. I hope that many Eugenians and not only our neighbors in the Trainsong neighborhood will get involved and speak up. After all, how would you feel if this was your neighborhood park?

We should all be concerned that a local public park is so polluted with dioxin that it is unsafe for any of us to use.

What should you know about dioxins?

Dioxins are toxic compounds that belong to the so-called dirty dozen. A group of dangerous chemicals known as persistent organic pollutants or pops dioxins are of concern because of their toxic persistence in the environment and their persistence in the tissue of all living things, including people.

If exposed to dioxin, children are especially at risk for long-term health problems such as cancer, reproductive dysfunction, and immune system impairment.

It is important to take a moment to note that Trainsong Park and the surrounding neighborhood has long been recognized as a place facing serious environmental justice issues.

For example, this neighborhood has the highest percentage of low-income and working-class families compared to other Eugene neighborhoods.

Trainsong is one of Eugene’s most racially diverse neighborhoods. And the residents of Trainsong have a long history of repeated exposures to toxic air, water, and soils.

The neighbors there have been fighting hard for protection from the well-known sources of environmental pollution, including the Union Pacific Railyard’s, long history of groundwater contamination, asbestos air contamination, diesel particulate pollution, and high levels of toxic chemicals in the soil and much more.

Most recently, there are new threats of dangerous pollution from an industry proposal to offload biodiesel and related fuels in the Eugene trainyard 24 hours a day.

You may wonder how the city learned that dioxins are contaminating the soil of the neighborhood park. The soil sampling was part of an Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (which is abbreviated as DEQ).

It was their study meant to determine the extent of chemical contamination at what is now a national priority superfund site, the J.H. Baxter industrial site located in the adjacent Bethel neighborhood. The agency needed to find out how far Baxter’s pollution had spread in the community.

The DEQ never intended to sample Trainsong Park. That site was not in the agency’s original sampling plan. However, community members strongly advocated that Trainsong Park be included in DEQ’s testing plan.

The surrounding community knew that Trainsong Park was suspected of being contaminated with industrial chemicals. The agency listened and took the samples.

What they found was far worse than what anyone had expected.

Soil sampling conducted between 2021 and 2026 revealed that about 50% of the park area contains high concentrations of dioxin. These concentrations rank as very unhealthy, meaning that the level is above 20 parts per trillion (PPT). That 20 PPT is the level which determines whether a cleanup program must be executed.

Areas of Trainsong Park closest to the playground equipment have levels as high as 160, 270 and 360 PPT. That’s up to 18 times greater than the health benchmark.

High levels of dioxin were also discovered on residential properties in the vicinity of the J.H. Baxter Superfund site.

Cleanup requirements in that scenario involved excavating tons and tons of soil and replacing it with clean topsoil for dozens of Bethel residential properties. The soil sampling and excavation and removal operations are still ongoing to this day.

These drastic remediation measures were taken because dioxin at and above 20 PPT can pose significant health risks, including skin lesions, immune system impairment, reproductive and developmental problems, and an increased risk of cancer.

Long-term exposure to high levels of dioxins is particularly concerning for vulnerable populations such as children and pregnant women.

The city of Eugene’s report titled ‘Analysis of Brownfield Cleanup Alternatives‘ presents basically two reasonable cleanup alternatives. Next time I’ll explain why I am opposing the city’s preferred alternative and why you should too. (I support Alternative 3, which would permanently remove contaminated soil from the park to eliminate human exposures.)

You can find the transcript of this essay and links to more information, such as the city of Eugene’s analysis of the alternatives, at KEPW.News. You’ll also find instructions on how to submit your public comment, as well as some suggested talking points and my chart comparing Alternatives 3 and 4 of the city’s suggested proposal.

To learn more, just Google ‘Oregon DEQ and Trainsong Park.’ That should take you to the correct webpage.

To provide comments on the proposed alternatives, send your email to Sarah Eagle at Sarah.Eagle@deq.oregon.gov by 5 p.m. on Dec. 11. That’s less than a month away. Thank you.

Presenter: Longtime environmental justice advocate Lisa Arkin encourages you to learn more about the Trainsong Park cleanup plan, and to share public comments by 5 p.m. Dec. 11, in support of Alternative 3.

For more information:

• Lisa’s chart showing why you should support Alternative 3
• Analysis of Brownfield Cleanup Alternatives
• How To Provide Public Comment
• EPA Brownfield Cleanup Grant application
• The city’s Cleanup Design Options spreadsheet
• Engage Eugene website
• Eugene Powerpoint presentation for the Sept. 24, 2026 public meeting
• Frequently Asked Questions, Dioxins In Soil At Trainsong Park And Adjoining Neighborhood