An attorney sent a letter to the city saying the space wasn't properly remediated after explosions in 1985 and 2003.

AUSTIN, Texas — As ground was officially broken in preparation for the new Austin FC stadium on Monday, one local lawyer is raising concern over how safe crews will be while they build it.

Attorney Bill Aleshire sent a letter to the City saying the construction site may not be safe for workers to be on.

McKalla Place used to be home to a chemical plant and solid waste disposal site. Aleshire claims the space wasn't properly remediated after explosions in 1985 and 2003.

"Morally, I feel obligated to raise this issue, to ask for someone to make sure, especially that the workers are safe with the work that apparently the City is going to go ahead and allow them to do," said Aleshire.

The city disputes that though.

Leaders say that, according to a 2017 report from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the risk level at the site is "low."

The City said extensive remediation to the site occurred in 2006, resulting in environmental clearance to an industrial/commercial land use standard. And, in June 2017, the TCEQ issued a final closure letter for unrestricted/residential land use.

"The vast majority of the site was excavated to bedrock, revealing a small amount of additional contaminants that were disposed of per protocol," a spokesperson for the City said. "The rest of the clean material was sifted, sorted and placed back on site. There are a few unexcavated areas beneath foundations that were constructed before the explosion occurred in 2003, but there is no expectation that contaminants would be found beneath them."

Aleshire isn't so sure.

"We don't know if it's hazard-free. We don't know if it's toxic-free," he said. "And what we discovered in these documents, that's mentioned in the report that I've sent to the Workers Defense Project to review, is that they never have excavated the entire site."