ICMA ON FUTURE LAND USE

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@igc.org>]

From: Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@igc.org>

ICMA ON DEFENSE'S DRAFT FUTURE LAND USE POLICY
The International City/County Management Association (ICMA), a leading 
voice for U.S. local governments on issues pertaining to military base 
cleanup and reuse, has submitted comments to the Defense Department 
(DoD) on its draft policy on Future Land Use. ICMA considers the draft 
policy a step in the right direction, but it wants it to go further.
First, ICMA seeks the addition of two statements that it says were 
included in a recent presentation by a DoD official: "First, that the 
services should never require a community accept property cleaned up to 
risk based levels unless the community, through an informed decision 
making process, accepts the level of cleanup. Second, that each 
community should be able to negotiate with the service to delineate 
when and if the service would return to the property after transfer to 
perform additional cleanup." 
Second, ICMA wants DoD and the service branches to "develop a procedure 
to ensure that local governments affected by a base closure are 
involved in the future use and institutional control development 
decision process from the beginning. This is especially important if 
the local government which will be responsible for institutional 
control implementation is not a member of the LRA [local reuse authority]."
Furthermore, ICMA lists seven additional points that it believes DoD 
should address in the Future Land Use Policy.
"1) What is DoD's policy to ensure that local communities and LRAs are 
not forced by the services to accept property cleaned up to future use 
levels with institutional controls when they want the property cleaned 
up to unrestricted use? If the local community decides that property 
should be cleaned up to background levels, how will DoD guarantee that 
the service branches will carry out the remediation process as quickly 
and effectively as possible.
2) What party is responsible for additional cleanup if the 
institutional control on a site fails? Does failure of the control 
constitute a failure of the remedy?
3) What party determines if the initial cleanup remedy fails?
4) What is the policy for determining which party is required to prove 
that additional contamination, caused by DoD, has been discovered on a site?
5) If a party would like to remove a deed or other restrictions from 
the property, who determines the adequacy of the demonstration? What is 
DoD's incentive to remove deed restrictions once a transfer has occurred?
6) Is DoD's sovereign immunity waived once DoD transfers the property 
to another party?
7) Will the individual armed services adopt the policy, as stated, and 
add language to transfer agreements specifically stating when that 
service branch will return to perform additional remediation at a site?"