Feedlot Is Called No Immediate Threat : Environment: Experts take soil samples in search for evidence of toxic waste buried on Agri-Empire farm. Heat and breakdowns slow the excavation effort.

Heat and equipment problems dogged hazardous materials experts searching for toxic wastes in a cattle feed yard Tuesday, but a state environmental official announced that the site does not appear to pose an immediate threat to public health.

The 100-acre lot--located in Lakeview, about 10 miles from downtown San Jacinto--is owned by Agri-Empire Corp. Informants have told investigators that employees buried as many as 7,000 used five-gallon pesticide, fungicide and herbicide containers on the property.

Officials did not unearth any obvious signs of contamination during the digging Tuesday.

Bill Carter, assistant secretary for law enforcement at the California Environmental Protection Agency, said contaminated ground water, if any eventually is found, is unlikely to have spread beyond the boundaries of the cattle yard.

“There is no immediate threat to public health related to ground water quality, nor related to the cattle that have been maintained on the feedlot,” Carter said at an afternoon news conference. “Further testing and soil sampling is under way to make a final determination in this regard.”

The material allegedly was buried in 1986 and 1987, said investigators, who served federal search warrants Monday for the feedlot, the Agri-Empire headquarters and a shed near a potato packaging plant. Agri-Empire is the nation’s largest family-owned potato company. It also owns thousands of head of cattle.

Larry Minor, the president and co-owner of Agri-Empire and a onetime champion drag racer, denied the allegations Monday and said he believed they were the work of disgruntled employees. He did not respond to a request for an interview Tuesday.

Although the Minors and their company are well liked in the San Jacinto Valley, the possibility of contamination on a large chunk of cattle-feeding land--which is also near a water reclamation area--raised grave concern among some residents. The afternoon news conference on the investigation was attended by several residents and officials from neighboring cities.

Hemet Mayor Gaila Jennings said city officials were relieved by Carter’s assessment of the immediate threat. But they remained concerned, she added.

“The ground water threat is a real issue,” Jennings said. “Everybody’s real concerned, and everybody’s wondering where this (the investigation) came from. It happened so suddenly.”

Investigators were extraordinarily tight-lipped about the progress of their search, and FBI agents at the feedlot and at the Ramada Inn, which is being used as a command post, refused to answer questions from reporters.

One other person participating in the investigation, however, said the search of a shed near one of Agri-Empire’s potato packing plants in Hemet turned up evidence of DDT, a once widely used insecticide that was banned years ago. FBI officials would not comment on the DDT.

The searches of the shed and of the company’s corporate headquarters in downtown San Jacinto were almost complete Tuesday, officials said.

The digging in the cattle yard was proceeding more slowly.

At daybreak, several dozen workers from state and local environmental and hazardous material agencies began the digging. Clad head-to-toe in protective clothing and wearing respirators with air tanks strapped to their backs, the crews removed soil and tested some of it at the site.

The crews worked all morning, but broke at midday when the blazing heat forced them to stop for several hours. Even in the morning and late afternoon they had to break frequently to strip off their protective gear and seek shade under a makeshift tent erected on the property.

The crews were concentrating on an area about 75 yards long and 50 yards wide, and officials said they expect the search to include other parts of the 100-acre tract as well.

In addition to the heat, the crews were delayed by equipment failure. A back hoe used to excavate dirt broke down and had to be repaired.

“The search of the feedlot will continue for several days since several large areas of the feedlot must be excavated,” said Charlie J. Parsons, special agent in charge of the Los Angeles office of the FBI. “The results of these searches will not be known for perhaps days or weeks.”

Parsons said results of the searches would be disclosed only if analysts determine that there is a substantial threat to public health or safety.

The preliminary tests being done at the feed yard can tell investigators which kinds of chemicals, if any, are being unearthed. But final analysis would probably be performed in labs in Los Angeles or Northern California.

Only once the soil sampling is under way can the water sampling begin, experts said. That is because investigators are probing for the presence of dozens of chemicals, and analysts need to know which ones to look for in the water supply before they send their samples in to be analyzed.

While the digging and testing got under way, the 900 or so head of cattle that had occupied the feedlot were moved. They were being penned on an adjacent lot Tuesday, and agents said that they too will be tested for contamination if toxic chemicals turn up in the soil or water.