Remediation work under way at former Starlite site in Medina

Photo by Ginny Kropf: Equipment is on site at the former Starlite Dry Cleaners. The state Department of Environmental Conservation’s Division of Environmental Remediation is doing remediation of the site, which burned in 2004. Work started last week and continues this week.

MEDINA – A plan for remediation of a site at 331 North Main St. has been solidified by the New York State Department of Environment’s Division of Environmental Remediation.

According to Medina Mayor Marguerite Sherman, the DEC knows where the contamination is on the site formerly occupied by Starlight Dry Cleaners. The business burned in 2004 and the building was demolished in 2016.

Information supplied to Sherman from Gail Dieter, environmental chemist with the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s Division of Environmental Remediation, states that an approximate 300-foot square area will be excavated to depths up to eight feet below ground surface.

An estimated 90 cubic yards of material will be disposed of off-site, and clean fill meeting state requirements will be brought in to replace the excavated soil.

Site cover will be maintained and may include paved surface parking areas, sidewalks or soil.

The planned remediation process has been approved by the New York State Department of Health.

Prior to the fire and demolition, the site contained a 4,332 square foot stone building constructed circa 1830 as a produce warehouse and a 3,258 square foot addition to the north built circa 1910 as a livery and hitch barn.

The building and addition were subsequently used for automobile sales and storage from about 1927 to 1948, and then as a dry cleaners from 1953 to 2004, when fire heavily damaged the building and destroyed the dry-cleaning facility.

Contaminants in the building included tetracholorethane, which was used from 1953 to the 1990s, when the business switched to petroleum-based solvent. Both a site characterization concluded in November 2009 and a remedial investigation in September 2017 identified chlorinated solvents in soil and groundwater samples from the source location likely proximate to the equipment maintenance area of the dry cleaners, according to the DEC.

Cost of the remediation is part of the state’s hazardous cleanup funding, according to Sherman.