The Illinois Department of Public Health has found a baseball field in Manners Park, located in Taylorville, has “high detections of lead.”
IPDH’s Sept. 1 report, published with the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, warns of elevated lead exposure for children and summer league baseball players who played on Field One of Manners Park prior to 2023. Lead poisoning is a life-threatening affliction. A 2015 National Institutes of Health paper explains, “there is almost no function in the human body which is not affected by lead toxicity.”
The IDPH report states the rest of Manners Park is safe to use, but also recommends the Taylorville Park District complete soil remediation of the superfund site. IPDH will host an open house from 4:30-6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 22, at the University of Illinois Extension Service office, 1120 N. Webster St., Taylorville.
“During this informal gathering, the public will be able to speak with IDPH environmental health staffers and ask questions about the site,” according to a written statement from IDPH. “Additional environmental sampling is planned to help the district decide the best clean-up options.”
The park sits directly east of an old Ameren gas plant that operated from 1892 to 1932 and produced coal tar as a byproduct, which “contaminated onsite groundwater and soil” in addition to contaminating private water wells located directly north of the site, according to the report. It also notes “numerous odor complaints due to excavation of soil contaminated by coal tar.”
Manners Park was founded in 1912, according to a a history of Taylorville page written by Wilda Q. Cooper.
The Taylorville Park District began using alternate baseball fields during its 2023 recreational league.
