The Quapaw Nation celebrates 10 years of battling “chat” piles
(October 3, 2023) Quapaw, Okla. – Quapaw Nation celebrates 10 years of managing and taking on Superfund Remedial Activities at the Tar Creek Superfund Site.
The Quapaw Nation took on and implemented their first US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) Superfund Remedial Response Cooperative Agreement in September 2013, known as the Catholic 40 project. This Cooperative Agreement would address approximately 108,000 tons of Superfund waste, know locally as “chat”.
The Quapaw Nation Environmental Department, the construction department of the Quapaw Nation, Quapaw Services Authority, the realty/trust services department and their cultural/historic preservation department worked together to preserve historic structures, artifacts and landscape features during the remedial activities. This was the first tribally managed Superfund Site cleanup in the United States, and today, Quapaw Nation, continues to set the example and build capacity to take on additional work of the 40 square mile Superfund Site.
Shortly after the remedial activities were completed at the Catholic 40, the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality (ODEQ), Land Protection Division approached the Quapaw Nation Environmental Department regarding remediating land near the Catholic 40. After an Inter-Agency Governmental Agreement was executed work began on that property and successfully remediated 85,000 tons of chat and contaminated soil.
The partnerships between US EPA, ODEQ and Quapaw Nation have grown to this day and over 6 million tons of chat and contaminated soil have been remediated through various cooperative and inter-agency governmental agreements. Quapaw Nation continues to meet and visit with project partners and will soon look to remediate an area near Treece, Kansas which was formerly within the original boundaries of the Quapaw Nation, known as the “Quapaw Strip”, under an US EPA Region 7 Remedial Response Cooperative Agreement. Two US EPA Regions, Two Superfund Sites in Tar Creek and Cherokee County, KS and tens of millions of tons of Superfund waste yet to be addressed.
This land will primarily be put back into some agricultural use, but the Quapaw Nation has their sights set on other uses, such as renewable energy. The Quapaw Nation Environmental Department has grown into an office of 10 with Engineers, Scientist, Managers, Specialists and Technicians, meanwhile, the Quapaw Services Authority has grown into a department of over 80 staffed with Construction Managers, Foremen, Operators, Truck Drivers and many laborers. The vested interest that the Quapaw Nation have in healing their land, healing their home can only mean they are here and committed to the cause for however long it may take to clean it up and make it home once again.