This story corrects the meeting date to Tuesday, Oct. 14
ST. CHARLES COUNTY — Hundreds of people are expected to attend a town hall focused on the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act on Tuesday in St. Peters, county officials said.
Earlier this year, Congress added four St. Charles County-area ZIP codes to the criteria of who is eligible for the federal program, which allows individuals to apply for financial compensation if they or a relative were diagnosed with cancer after being exposed to radiation from the nation’s nuclear program.
Federal budget estimates show up to 300,000 people in the ӣƵ region could qualify and receive a total of $4 billion in compensation.
The four St. Charles County ZIP codes now covered include Lake Saint Louis, 63367; O’Fallon and Dardenne Prairie, 63368; Defiance, 63341; and St. Peters, Weldon Spring and Cottleville, 63304.
The four ZIP codes were chosen to cover people who may have lived, worked or gone to school near the EPA Superfund sites in Weldon Spring, where Mallinckrodt Chemical Co. refined uranium during the Cold War era. The site was later closed and abandoned for many years, before it was remediated and capped with a mountain of rocks.
“This is a federally funded and federally run program,” County Executive Steve Ehlmann said in a statement announcing the town hall. The event is scheduled from 6-8 p.m. Tuesday at the Spencer Road Library Branch, 427 Spencer Road in St. Peters.
“The County has some documents needed to qualify, documents to show you lived in the affected ZIP codes,” he said.
State Rep. Tricia Byrnes, R-Wentzville, will serve as emcee of the town hall. Among those scheduled to speak are Recorder of Deeds Mary Dempsey and St. Charles County Election Authority Director Kurt Bahr.
Post-Dispatch photographers capture tens of thousands of images every year. See some of their best work from September 2025 in this video. Edited by Jenna Jones.
