YOUNGSTOWN — As a precautionary measure against potential contamination, a chain-link fence should be up next week surrounding the former Masters Tuxedo site.

An April 30 fire destroyed the vacant building, and the site has been open without any fencing for several months.

The city’s board of control agreed Thursday to pay $5,017.32 for the fence that will be there for about a year.

The decision came at the recommendation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which suggested the fence as a precaution as there could be harmful dry-cleaning chemicals at the property at 3600 Market St., said Tara Cioffi, the city’s environmental health director.

The EPA is doing additional testing, but the “preliminary result is there’s a concern” of tetrachloroethylene, known as perchloroethylene or PCE, on the site, Cioffi said.

PCE is commonly used for dry-cleaning clothes. Contact with PCE — primarily exposure to very high levels — can cause health problems such as dizziness, headaches, unconsciousness and cancer, according to the U.S. EPA. Exposure can also lead to death, according to the EPA.

“We don’t know what the next step is,” said Kevin Flinn, the city’s buildings and grounds commissioner. “We’re waiting for the EPA.”

About 880 feet of chain-link fence will be installed likely next week, he said.

The city’s street department spent about six weeks demolishing, removing debris and fire remains and then backfilling and regrading the Masters lot, Flinn said.

The lot had temporary mesh fencing up while the work was ongoing, but people walking to adjacent buildings pushed it over, Flinn said.

The EPA tested Grovewood Manor, 3531 Hillman St., behind the Masters property for PCE and it tested “below detectable levels,” Cioffi said.

The city and EPA have gone to 15 houses near the Masters site — eight on West Judson Avenue and seven on West Ravenwood Avenue — seeking permission from the property owners to do interior testing for levels of PCE, Cioffi said. The EPA “already took soil samples and because of that they want to go inside people’s homes to get better tests,” she said.

So far, an overwhelming number of visits to the houses have resulted in no one being home with only two people agreeing to it, Cioffi said.

If the EPA finds detectable levels of PCE, it would remediate at no cost using an air filtration mitigation system, she said.

An April 30 fire destroyed the vacant South Side structure, built in 1950. It has previously been a sporting goods store and a bowling alley. Masters ran a dry-cleaning business and tuxedo rental shop out of the location for about 10 years starting in 1990.

The city took control of the vacant building in 2010 and had unsuccessfully tried to lease it before it was destroyed in the fire. Found in the fire remains were hundreds of tuxedos.

dskolnick@tribtoday.com