It's Curious City, where we take your questions about Chicago and the region, and investigate, report.

Explore.

From WBEZ.

Beth Braun lives over the border in the Indiana community of Chesterton.

From her porch, Beth can see the flames of a steel mill nearby.

I see the smoke coming up and then at night you can see just the fire and if there's clouds

in the area. They just light up. Beth is 25 and works in an attorney's office and at a local

cat shelter. She grew up in the region and she loves Chesterton, especially all the vegan

restaurants. I've always been here and my family's here, all my friends are here.

Beth plans on staying in Chesterton even though the steel mill is nearby,

which is why she's worried about an investigative report she read recently in the Chicago Tribune.

The investigation found that mill produces more lead emissions than any other industrial source in the country.

Nearly 18,000 pounds of the stuff in 2016.

Particularly concerning for Beth, regulators can't explain where the lead is landing.

It might be in Chesterton where she lives.

I just thought that was really interesting and kind of scary and like we don't know where it's

landing or where it's blowing to.

And Chesterton could be one of those places.

So Beth wondered, what do you do when you learn about lead pollution so close to your home?

What do you do if you're concerned your yard might be contaminated with lead?

How do you go about testing the soil?

And what do you do with the results?

...