SLUDGE VICTIMS

Lake said she was very much relieved. However, the tests may not contradict each other, if -- as seems to be the case -- Joiner tested for total coliform and the other labs tested only for fecal coliform.
Health Department standards require the absence of any coliform bacteria. Coliform bacteria is an indicator of the probable presence of pathogens.

The Settles
Sherri and Larry Settle live in a house near Beauregard Farms, a 3,082-acre farm near Brandy Station where sludge is applied. Beauregard is owned by Johanna Quandt and her family - very wealthy Germans who are reportedly the main stockholders in BMW - and managed by Jim Bowen.

The Settles blame sludge for the death in January-of their Great Dane, who drank water in the fields at Beauregard. Sherri Settle was admitted to the hospital for two days herself and diagnosed with an intestinal virus on Jan. 28-29,something, she said she'd never had before. She has also, she said, developed pink, scaly stuff' on her trunk and legs where the water touches her in the bathtub. Settle said that she has seen her water come out of of the tap black"like charcoal."

Recently, Settle said, her water has cleared up. But, she noted that no geese have come to the lakes on Beauregard -Farm this spring, as they did in previous years.

Bowen said that sludge was applied on 500 of the property's 3,600 acres last year and on another 500 this winter, with more to come. Bowen said that six to eight neighbors had signed waivers of distance restrictions (county law requires that sludge be kept 400 feet from occupied dwellings), and that for about 12 rentals on the property there was no need for waivers.

"Nobody's complained to me,' Bowen said.

Asthma, allergies, and sludge odor
Diane Reno is a Stevensburg resident with asthma and allergies who says she still suffers whenever she has to drive through areas that were sludged last November.

"It has a musty, moldy smell, and I'm highly allergic to mold . . . . When I come through that area I have to use an inhaler.I get headaches." Reno said her granddaughter an son-in-law also get headaches from being in sludged areas.

"I don't know why the board won't listen to us and find out what's in this stuff . . . . We're not opposing farmers. I have 40 acres. We're from farming families. We just don't want it to end up killing people.

" . . . . They say it's psychological. It is not psychological. I have to usr my inhaler. I feel like I can't breathe_. I liked it here until that stuff started being spread."

Complaints about sludge use in Culpeper have increased, and the Board of Supervisors' Rules Committee has taken steps toward beginning to monitor the practice.

Meanwhile, the Environmental Protection Agency's Inspector General issued a report on March 20 finding that "while EPA promotes land application, EPA cannot assure the public that current land application practices are protective of human health and the environment."

Since then, the-chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives' Science Committee has recommended ceasing the spraying of class B sludge (which is used here in Culpeper) and getting the Centers for Disease Control involved in studying it. reference

The county Rules Committee, which is made up of supervisors Jimmy Lee (R-Cedar Mt.), Carolyn Smith (R-West Fairfax) and John Coates (I-Salem) met