Take Action: Superfund
At the end of July New York State's Superfund program will have gone 16 months without funding to carryout necessary cleanup actions at New York's contaminated sites. This means that activities at a large number of sites are stalled until new funding is made available. According to DEC, as of February of this year there are 788 sites that are affected by the lack of funding. Sites are stalled at various points in the cleanup process, at some sites no environmental sampling has occurred, at others everything is set for cleanup to begin, all they need is funding. The affected sites range from relatively small sites with a single contaminant to huge sites that contain high concentrations of a large number of contaminants.
There are some environmental problems that all of us can take a hand in solving. Problems, like those caused by polluting automobile emissions, can be addressed not only by government intervention, but also by actions taken by consumers in choosing efficient cars, etc. Our current Superfund problem however is the sole responsibility of Governor Pataki, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno. Only these three men have the authority to appropriate funding for state programs. So far these leaders have failed to use their authority to address this critical environmental issue.
In large part due to pressure from Sierra Club and other environmental groups, the Governor and legislative leaders engaged in promising negotiations in mid June. Unfortunately the process is currently in a stalemate.
In my judgment the failure of negotiations is due to a combination of entrenched positions on key issues and a political decision by parties on all sides of the debate that no solution serves their interests better than a compromise that may anger certain constituencies.
Negotiators have had difficulty resolving issues related to the goal of cleanups, criteria for remedy selection, standards for soil cleanups, standards for groundwater cleanups, amount of funding on an annual basis, mechanisms for funding and the number of years for which funding would be provided. There are differences on other significant issues, but those issues are likely to be dealt with more easily.
While issues like tax credits for developers, length of time that the program would be funded for and the amount of funding have all been points of disagreement, the key issue on which negotiations have stalled appears to be the goal of cleanup. The Governor and the Senate are backing a goal of protecting the public health and the environment based on the proposed use of the site while the Assembly is backing a goal protective of public health and the environment with a preference for permanent remedies that do not rely on engineering or institutional controls. In the course of negotiations, Assembly staff report that they explained their position as requiring that free product, or undiluted toxic substances, be removed, and hot spots, or sources of high concentrations of contaminants that were spreading to other locations or other media would also be removed. Reportedly, Dale Denoyers, Director the DEC's Voluntary Cleanup Program responded that it is not current practice to remove free product or hot spots at all sites and they would not agree to bill language that would require this. This reflects a change from the DEC's prior practice. In the course of the Superfund Working Group agency representatives reported that the minimum required at any site would be to remove free product and sources of contamination. This is a very basic issue, if they can't get beyond this, it will be difficult to work out any deal.
There is a strong sense on the part of the Assembly that it would be unwise to codify questionable clean up practices. There appears to be a strong sense on the part of the Governor's office that these kinds of cleanups can be done safely and they are necessary to promote voluntary cleanups.
As was reported by Jim Odato in the Times Union on July 8, disagreements on substantive points are complicated by the Governor's strong showing in the polls. According to Odato, quoting sources in the Governor's office, they feel that with their strong base of support they don't have to compromise and they don't want to do anything controversial that may change the current level of support. There is a similar factor at play in the Assembly. The Assembly views the Governor's superfund policy as a weakness in his environmental record that could be attacked by Cuomo or McCall. In this political equation neither side feels pressured to compromise.
Our best hope to break this stalemate is to persistently and continuously bring home to state residents the ongoing danger of uncontrolled hazardous waste sites and the failure of our leaders in Albany to address this danger. Join us in contacting state Senate and Assembly members and the Governor by phone or letter, and in writing letters to the editor asking them to stop stalling and do the right thing.
Addresses and telephone numbers for Senators and
Assembly members can be found on the web sites: www.senate.state.ny.us
and www.assembly.state.ny.us.
The governor can be contacted by mail at:
Governor David A. Patterson
State Capital
Albany, NY 12224.
From material prepared by John Stouffer, Atlantic Chapter Legislative Director.