Black Creek Elementary: What We Know, What We Have Learned, and What Comes Next
By Matthew Ferguson, Ed.D, Esq.
Superintendent of the Darlington County School District
When I pull into a school car line, I am not thinking first as superintendent. I am thinking as a dad.
I know what it feels like to watch your child walk through the doors of a school and drive away trusting the adults inside with the person who matters most to you.
That is why I want to be clear about Black Creek Elementary: I would never knowingly ask another parent to leave a child in a place that we believed was unsafe.
If the environmental and public health agencies responsible for evaluating Black Creek told us that students should not be there, we would act. Period.
After extensive soil testing and separate risk assessments, the South Carolina Department of Environmental Services (SCDES) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) concluded that the conditions identified at Black Creek do not present an exposure concern for students or staff.
That does not mean parents should not ask questions. They should. And it does not mean there is nothing for us to learn from how we got here.
What it does mean is that our decisions about children need to be based on the evidence, not on the most alarming headline or the loudest voice in the room.
So, how did we get here?
Decades before Darlington County School District owned the Black Creek property, the land was used for agriculture and received treated wastewater material from the former Galey & Lord textile facility. The material was applied to agricultural fields as fertilizer.
This was not unique to Black Creek Elementary. According to SCDES, the Black Creek site was one of numerous agricultural fields in and around Darlington County where this material was applied. More broadly, the land application of treated wastewater material has been a regulated agricultural practice in South Carolina for decades and remains permissible today.
Before purchasing the property, the district commissioned a Phase I Environmental Site Assessment, a standard environmental review conducted before buying property. That review did not uncover this part of the property’s history and no additional testing was recommended.
We cannot change that fact, and we should not pretend otherwise.
When we learned in March 2026 that the property had historically received this material, we contacted SCDES and EPA. From that point forward, our responsibility was clear: cooperate fully, request the state’s environmental experts investigate, communicate with families and follow the evidence wherever it led.
Along the way, I have had to learn a lot about PFAS.
I am not an environmental scientist, and I do not pretend to be one. What I have learned is that PFAS are much more common than I realized. These chemicals have been used for decades in industrial processes and everyday consumer products and are now found widely in our environment.
That does not mean PFAS should be ignored. Scientists continue to study their potential health effects. But finding PFAS is not, by itself, the same thing as determining that a place is unsafe.
What matters is what was found, at what level, how someone might actually be exposed and what that exposure means for human health.
Those are the questions the experts at SCDES and EPA evaluated at Black Creek.
SCDES collected 68 soil samples from across the property, with most taken from playgrounds and other locations where children and employees would be most likely to encounter soil. The samples were tested for metals, PCBs, pesticides and PFAS.
No metals, PCBs or pesticides were found at levels of concern, according to the DES and EPA report of the results.
At two playground locations, three PFAS compounds were found at levels that triggered a closer review under EPA guidelines.
That does not mean those locations were determined to be unsafe. It means the results needed a closer look.
SCDES and EPA then conducted separate risk assessments. Both reached the same conclusion: the conditions identified did not present an exposure concern for students or staff.
Even though the agencies determined the site was safe, we are taking additional precautions. SCDES suggested covering exposed soil in play areas with grass or another suitable material. We followed that recommendation. Grass was planted and is growing. In addition, as is common practice at all schools, students are asked to wash their hands throughout the day. Black Creek is also served by the public water system and does not use a private well.
We have learned something as a district. The environmental review conducted before the property was purchased did not uncover this history. Going forward, when we evaluate property for a future school, we will look beyond the standard environmental review and more deeply examine how the land was used in the past and what environmental records are available.
When we learn something, we should get better because of it. We will.
Some have also asked why we have not opened Black Creek to outside researchers who want to conduct their own testing.
Black Creek is first and foremost an operating elementary school serving children. It is not an unrestricted research site.
For this investigation, we have relied on the state and federal agencies charged with environmental protection. They developed the sampling approach, collected samples, analyzed the findings and independently evaluated potential risk.
SCDES has made its fact sheet, sampling information, analytical report, raw data and other materials available to the public on its Black Creek Elementary PFAS Soil Investigation webpage at https://bit.ly/desbcesoilresults.
We welcome scrutiny of the science.
Anyone, including independent scientists, can review the data, examine how the testing was conducted and question the conclusions. If SCDES or EPA determines that additional sampling is necessary, we will cooperate just as we have throughout this process.
There is always room for hard questions when children’s safety is involved. But there is also a difference between an alarmist headline and a demonstrated health risk.
Parents and the public deserve the whole story: what happened decades ago, what we knew when the property was purchased, what we later learned, what testing found, what it did not find, and what the agencies responsible for evaluating environmental risk concluded.
We will continue working with SCDES and EPA, following their recommendations and responding to substantive new information. We will continue communicating with families. And we will apply what we have learned from Black Creek to future decisions.
Parents and the public have every right to ask hard questions.
Our responsibility is to answer them with facts, acknowledge what we know and what we do not know, learn from what we could have done better, and act when the evidence tells us action is necessary.
That is what I would expect for my own children.
It is what every Darlington County parent should expect from us.