HELENA - Workers removing asbestos from contaminated homes in Libby had their wages slashed last month as U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials try to stretch cleanup dollars for the town designated the nation's highest priority Superfund site.

"We started looking at ways we could reduce costs and get more cleanup done," said Jim Christiansen, EPA project manager for the Libby cleanup project. "We've done quite a bit to do that and the one of the last ways was worker wages."

Workers had their pay abruptly cut from about $24 an hour to about $14 late last month, he said, adding that he regrets the severity of the cut and the short notice of it workers received. The cut was announced to workers the day before it went into effect.

Christiansen said Monday the wage reduction went too far, and the EPA is working to restore at least some of the workers' former pay. A meeting is planned in Libby on Wednesday to discuss the situation with workers.

He hopes their wages will be bumped to about $19 an hour. Workers will also be paid back pay to restore some of the cut. He said he expects the situation to be resolved in a few weeks.

"It sounds really bad, and it was really bad," he said. "The way it happened wasn't the way I wanted it to happen. The workers are very upset and if I was them, I would be, too. We've been working really hard in the last couple of weeks to get this turned around."

Libby is the site of a former W.R. Grace vermiculite mine, which produced vermiculite fibers for insulation and soil conditioners for decades. At its peak, the mine produced up to 80 percent of the world's supply of vermiculite. The ore mined in Libby was contaminated with asbestos, which can cause lung disease and cancer. Hundreds of former miners and their families have since died of lung disease.

The EPA started cleaning up the mine in 1999 and removing tainted insulation from homes and businesses a few years later.

Reasons for the wage reduction were two-fold, Christiansen said. First, officials were looking for a way to hire more workers and clean up more homes and businesses with the same amount of money. Secondly, he said, the duties of the cleanup workers had changed from officially designated "heavy construction" work to work more in line with "residential construction."

Because the workers are paid with federal money, their wages are set according to federal standards. The wage for "residential construction" workers is less than the federally designated wage for "heavy construction" crews, Christiansen said. Consequently, EPA decided it could pay the workers less based on the kind of work they were doing.

The savings will be used to hire more workers this spring and summer.

Christiansen said there were about 30 to 40 cleanup workers affected by the change.

The U.S. Department of Labor is now doing a wage assessment to see what fair pay for the current cleanup work should be.

"We're looking at about $19.55," he said.

Christiansen said the Libby cleanup project - designated the highest Superfund priority in the nation - has always been tight on money. He said his initial goal was to clean up 250 homes and businesses each year with a total of about 1,200 homes and businesses. But last year, the project had enough money to do only 130 houses. Christiansen said that even with the wage cuts, he doesn't think the agency will be able to clean up that many houses this year.

"The budget is a little tighter this year," he said.

Gayla Benefield, president of the Lincoln County Asbestos Victims Relief Organization, said the pay cut is unacceptable.

Libby Mayor Tony Berget said that while he was displeased with the sudden cut, he thinks the EPA is doing its best to make amends.

"I'm pleased with the EPA's response," he said.

Both Montana's U.S. senators - Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. - said they were contacted by upset workers in Libby soon after the cut went down.

"These workers are doing an important job and a difficult job and they need to compensated fairly," said Burns' spokesman J.P. Donovan.

The Baucus camp offered similar sentiments.

"Max is extremely frustrated that it appears that momentum for (cleaning up) Libby seems to be fading," he said.