Yesterday, I responded to the last of several newspaper articles
forwarded by Lenny that had a caption involving Uniroyal. I was using these articles
seem to raise the issue of whether our brownfield programs are being
sufficiently diligent to make sure that public funds are not being used when viable
corporate PRPs remain to cleanup sites that they abandon. As it turns out, the particular
article that I used to raise this issue did not contain all of the facts and it
turns out that the corporate PRP did contribute its fair share to that
particular site. However, there have been enough examples in the stories that
Lenny has forwarded to suggest that this particular case was an aberration.
Given the diminishing public resources, it would be good to
know if policy makers are ensuring that public funds are not being used for
sites with viable PRPs or at least have policies in place to minimize such
instances. I am not advocating holding up development to pursue cost recovery
but there does not seem to be any systematic effort to recovery funds for the
$$ used to fund brownfield cleanups AFTER the cleanup has been completed.
I fear our brownfield programs are facilitating the creation
of NEW brownfields. Many corporations do not take environmental issues into
account in their calculus when deciding to abandon sites and export jobs. Frequently,
facilities change ownership and each successive owner engages in the
environmental version of musical chairs, postponing dealing with environmental
issues until the plant is no longer economically viable to operate. Unfortunately,
when the music ends, it is usually the taxpayers who are left without a chair.
The owners don’t worry about the environmental consequences, figuring
that the local or state government wont take action until owner is gone, and then
state or federal brownfield programs will pay for the mess they leave behind.
I’m sure there are some who will disagree with my
observations since we can all point to particular situations where a
responsible party may have acted “responsible”. Indeed, I have been
involved in some projects where the PRP made a “contribution” or
donation towards an affordable housing or non-profit project constructed on a
contaminated site. But my experience has been that these situations are far and
few between. In any event, we only have anecdotal evidence on the extent of the
problem. I tried to find out if the federal government had some objective data
or studies that evaluate this issue but haven’t been able to find it. I
wonder if anyone has such empirical data. Maybe I should ask the folks at
WikiLeaks to look into this J
Lawrence Schnapf
Schnapf Law Office
55 East 87th
Street #8B
New York, New York 10128
212-756-2205 (p)
212-646-8483 (c)
Larry@SchnapfLaw.com
www.SchnapfLaw.com