Company buys bottled water for residents after tainting groundwater

PAW PAW (NEWSCHANNEL 3) - Some people have been told to stop drinking their water and switch to bottled water.

The people affected are living near the Minute Maid plant owned by Coca Cola on Red Arrow Highway in Paw Paw.

For 23 years, the Coke plant sprayed waste water into the soil. Some companies still do it.

What many people are finding is that waste water is contaminating wells in the area. What's news here, the source is not running from responsibility.

"We believe in being responsible and this is part of being that," said a representative from the plant.

A handful of people living about a half mile from the Coca Cola plant in Paw Paw received letters stating their well water contained too many metals.

For years Coke sprayed waste water into the ground. Over time, the water decomposes. That pulls oxygen from the soil. With oxygen being pulled out, that exposes natural metals to groundwater.

To combat this Coke had to shell out big money. "In conjunction with the MDEQ, we decided to build a state of the art wastewater treatment plant. We spent seven million dollars to process our waste and deliver it back cleaner to the environment," said the plant representative.

Ted and Marian Sinkewiz have two wells on roughly ten acres. One well is highly contaminated, the other slightly. The water flows from the Coke plant toward their neighborhood.

Now Ted and Marian get their water from a dispenser, provided by Coke. They were impressed with the companies up front approach.

"They came out and gave us the scoop on what's happening. We liked it. We liked what they had to say. They were quite honest," said Ted Sinkewiz.

The Sinkewizs are in the process of moving into a new house. Putting a dispenser in during a move is a hassle. One that was eased by Coke's honesty.

"It isn't as big as I was afraid it would be. I found a niche for it. It didn't fit into my decorating and I'm already into our house and trying to fit everything in anyway," said Marian Sinkewiz.

We spoke with a person at the Department of Environmental Quality. He says the well water problem is an ongoing investigation and Coke has been up front the entire time.

The solution may be for Coke to drill new wells for every house. The deepest one we found was 80 feet. The village has a couple up the road much deeper than that and they are OK.

If new wells are drilled, it most likely won't be before next year.