MUSKEGON COUNTY, Mich. -- Greg Asquith said he's been's drinking the water at Maple Island Estates mobile home park since 1969.
"There's no odor to the water whatsoever, and it tastes excellent," Asquith sipped from a glass.
But, in 2014, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality took exception with how the park handles raw sewage. Asquith now owns the park and for years, he processed the tenants sewage on-site. The system poured the final product onto park ground.
Asquith said, "We have our own wastewater treatment plant. It's a Walker package treatment system, and that unit did a good job of removing the solids and the BOD and such out of the water. However, the phosphate count was too high in the system."
So to protect the wells and groundwater, he said the state gave him an ultimatum. Either he could modify his system or connect to the county treatment facility next door within 30 days. It was a much larger undertaking that Asquith said ended up taking him 9 months to complete and costed him $300,000.
"So because we didn't correct it in 30 days, I was charged with this dumping," Asquith said.
He served 6 months probation for 'discharging a harmful substance'. Steve Luke, who Asquith hired to connect a pipeline to the county facility, reached out to FOX 17 and claimed that Asquith still wasn't in compliance. However, Asquith provided recent lab results that he said prove otherwise. Each document shows various water samples that tested negative for coliform bacteria.
Two kitchen taps, a well, and a raw tap well all tested negative at the park, according to the DEQ documents.
Asquith said, "What they found out was, ya know, everything lined up with exactly what it should be. No problem with the water whatsoever."
The DEQ confirmed with FOX 17 that Asquith is in compliance. Starting today, the pipeline connecting his treatment system to the county system should have gone on line. However, the county said the soil compaction test wasn't approved. That's process is still ongoing.
Getting all of this resolved may be even more of a challenge. Today, Asquith reported to the Muskegon County Jail to serve a six month jail sentence. He said he failed to turn in a 'ground soil sample' to the state by the court's deadline. His release date is April 2017.
