Members of the Fifth and Hill Neighborhood Rights Campaign met Thursday night to learn the results of the chemical testing done by AmerenIP in their neighborhood.

The meeting, which took place at the Douglass Annex, 804 N. Fifth St., focused on a now empty lot sitting at the intersection of Fifth and Hill streets in Champaign. The site once held a manufactured gas plant, and the group now says harmful by-products remain underneath the surface.

Ameren, the Illinois energy utility responsible for the site’s cleanup, began testing the site for contaminants in 1991 following an Interim Site Remediation, for which Ameren removed 1,500 tons of soil and replaced it with fresh soil, said Grant Antoline, an organizer of the Champaign County Health Care Consumers.

Testing is ongoing, and the meeting revealed a breakdown of Ameren’s results.

“The reason we’re here is because for all the time this has been going on, no one has seen this information,” said Champaign County Health Care Consumers Director Claudia Lennhoff. “It took us three months or more for us to understand this information and make it presentable.”

The results showed the presence of several chemicals on site.

“Test showed high concentration as deep as 20 feet under ground,” Antoline said. “There were even high concentrations at 20 plus feet.”

The levels of all chemicals discovered at the Fifth and Hill streets site are higher than the guidelines set by the Illinois EPA for toxic chemicals, Lennhoff said.

He believes that toxins could extend as much as five blocks outside of the site that Ameren is testing.

Lennhoff also blamed the city of Champaign, blaming faulty infrastructures in the neighborhood for fostering the spread of the contaminants.

“We want to remind people of the importance of the city’s infrastructure, because this can affect contamination,” said Lennhoff.

Concerned community members formed the Fifth and Hill Neighborhood Rights Campaign in 2007. At the meeting, resident Simone Ford urged her fellow community member to become involved in working to ensure that Ameren makes their neighborhood a safe place to live.

Ameren was not immediately available for comment Thursday night.

Members of this campaign are displaying yard signs, educating the community and signing petitions to gain public awareness.