RE: [CPEO-BIF] BoRit Asbestos Piles, Ambler, Pennsylvania

["Chisholm, Deb" <ChisholmD@nashuanh.gov>]

First, EPA's Emergency Response group needs to see an immediate risk to human health or the environment in order to make a case for spending funds on a project.  If the piles are presently "capped" with soil and vegetated, then the exposure risks are less and may not, in their eyes, warrant funding.
 
Second, the folks in Ambler should be careful what they wish for when asking for NPL status.  Just ask the residents of Stratford, CT, a Raybestos company town, if their asbestos-related problems were solved by being listed on the NPL.  The original facility (Operable Unit 1) was listed final on the NPL in 1995 and the remedy (capping) was completed in 1997.  Several additional operable units with asbestos contamination have yet to be cleaned up despite initial sampling efforts beginning in 1993.
 
Lenny, your arguments against redevelopment as a means to implement a remedy for clean up seem weak.  The idea that soil disturbance precludes redevelopment is flawed on its face.  Using proper precautions when dealing with asbestos can ensure a safe clean up, as with any contaminants. And the idea that cleanup and redevelopment of a parcel should be hindered because it doesn't deal with other privately-owned parcels with separate owners is just silly. 
 
The presumption would be that the redevelopment/cleanup would fall under the oversight of the PA DEP and would need to follow the same protocols for protection of the health and safety of the citizens of Ambler, while at the same time putting the site back to productive reuse.  
 
Funding to address cleanups is a major problem with the current EPA Brownfields program.  $200,000 to clean up sites that may previously have been cleaned up using Superfund money is clearly inadequate.  Kudos to those communities who have managed to create public/private partnerships to cobble together enough money to clean sites up.  That may be Ambler's only hope.
 
 
Deb Chisholm
Brownfields Coordinator
Nashua Community Development Division
City Hall, 229 Main Street, PO Box 2019
Nashua, NH 03061-2019
Phone: (603) 589-3074
Cell Phone: (603) 491-7763
Fax: (603) 589-3119

________________________________

From: brownfields-bounces@list.cpeo.org on behalf of Lenny Siegel
Sent: Wed 2/21/2007 5:53 PM
To: Brownfields Internet Forum
Subject: Re: [CPEO-BIF] BoRit Asbestos Piles, Ambler, Pennsylvania



Perhaps someone on this list could do a better job than I in answering
Peter's question.

Lenny

peter wrote:
> Lenny:
>
> It would be worthwhile if you could explain how EPA can "step up" and
> declare an Emergency Response Action under CERCLA without it being first
> listed as an NPL site. It seems that EPA is taking a very proactive role;
> although I don't know under what authority.
>
> Peter Strauss
>


--


Lenny Siegel
Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org <http://www.cpeo.org/> 


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