A team from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected in a Columbia neighborhood today to further study toxic lead and arsenic pollution discovered recently in people’s yards.

State regulators say they will assist the EPA in taking air and soil samples in Edisto Court, a small community off Rosewood Drive near the Jim Hamilton-L.B. Owens downtown airport.

Mark Plowden, a spokesman with the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control, said the air sampling should determine if arsenic or lead has been stirred into the air by traffic. Soil testing will follow up on DHEC’s work last week, he said.

Testing is expected to go through early next week. An attempt to reach an EPA spokesman was unsuccessful Thursday.

State regulators suspect a fertilizer company that closed more than 70 years ago allowed lead and arsenic to drain off the site and onto land later used for homes. An asphalt plant also is in the area, but state regulators don’t think it contributed to the pollution.

Sammy Fretwell