Radioactive uranium wastes from out of state will be banned under a new plan to clean up the defunct Dawn Mining Co. mill site near Spokane, the state Department of Health says. The plan also would speed up the reclamation project by six years, the agency said April 11. The new plan also cuts the amount of liquid waster discharged by the project by 1.9 million gallons per year. Uranium produced by the nearby Midnite Mine during the Cold War was processed at the Dawn mill, near the town of Ford. That mine is a much larger cleanup project and is a federal Superfund site. A federal health survey is under way to determine whether members of the tribe were harmed by proximity to the mine. The uranium lode was discovered in 1954. Newmont Mining Co. of New York bought controlling interest in the mine in 1955 and built a $3 million mill at Ford to process the ore. The mine closed in 1981. Dawn now expects to close the mill site by 2013, six years earlier than the previous schedule.
