State Targets Toxic Waste Site in Escondido

In the first action using a statewide voter-approved act to clean up toxic waste, state health officials on Friday notified the owners of a six-acre toxic waste site here that if they don’t prepare by March 10 specific plans to determine how badly the land is contaminated, the state will make the assessment itself and send them the bill.

Such a “site characterization” plan would next lead to proposals on how to clean the property, and the cleanup itself might occur before the end of the year, state officials said. The money to pay for the work, estimated at about $2.5 million, already has been set aside by the state, officials say.

Friday’s action is the first time in California that the state Department of Health Services has implemented last year’s $100-million Hazardous Substance Cleanup Bond Act, authorized by voters to finance toxic waste cleanup around the state.

And, more importantly to San Diego County health officials, the “remedial action order” by the state is the strongest action yet taken in a four-year campaign to clean up the Chatham Brothers property in the 2200 block of Bernardo Avenue, a rural neighborhood on the southwest side of the city.

The site was used for some 40 years by brothers Robert and Tom Chatham for a chemical distilling and reclamation operation and a chemical drum reclamation facility. Health officials in 1981 declared it a hazardous waste site because of the presence, at or near ground level, of PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls, suspected of increasing the risk of cancer) and a variety of heavy metals. Investigators have found several small pits up to three feet deep with gooey black material and what appear to be settling ponds where the ground is soft but nothing grows.

State and county health officials say they are still unsure just how dangerous the site is because there has not been an excavation to determine what might be buried beneath the surface, or whether it has contaminated the underground water supply that leads to Lake Hodges. Investigators have concluded, however, there is neither a health threat to neighbors nor any contamination of the atmosphere.

The state is finally able to demand a cleanup of the site because the bond money has been released by the Legislature to enforce cleanup orders, officials say. Until now, the orders have gone unheeded because the state had little money to do the work itself if the property owner refused, they said.

Between 20 and 30 sites around California are being identified for cleanup this year, and the Chatham Brothers site, although not the largest or most dangerous in California, was the first in the state to be targeted for the cleanup, said Jim Smith, who heads the assessment and mitigation office of the Department of Health Services’ toxic substances control division.

“We’re ready to move on a number of sites, and this is simply the first one we got around to,” he said. “This is a classic site because it can and should be mitigated, and the responsible parties so far have chosen not to. We’ve put an awful lot of effort on this specific site. It fits the mold for this kind of action.”

Before the bond act, the state ranked toxic sites on a priority list, a pecking order to determine which sites could receive some of the scant $10 million in state funds that were available yearly. The average toxic site cleanup cost more than $6 million.

The Chatham site has Ping-Ponged on the ranking list, being as high as 16 and as low as 77 in February, 1985--and back to 29 the following month. Six months ago, it was ranked 43rd. Because the site has not posed an immediate health threat, at no time has it ranked high enough to win money from the state fund.

But that list was eliminated with the implementation of the bond act on Oct. 1, and the state wants to move forward on 20 or 30 less spectacular but nonetheless important sites, such as Chatham’s, that can be cleaned up this year to show some immediate payoffs for the bond act.

Smith said if the Chathams fail to come up with a specific plan on how to assess the amount of contamination on the parcel, the state will do the work and bill the Chathams, tacking on a 10% surcharge for administrative overhead. While there is no penalty assessment, “having the state contract for the work is penalty enough from a practical matter because it would cost the state more to do the work than if it were contracted privately,” Smith said.

Had the site been declared a “substantial or imminent endangerment”--which it has not--the owners would face a penalty of three times the cost of the work if they refused to do it themselves, Smith said.

Complicating the cleanup of the property has been a dispute over who was responsible for the work. The Chathams sold a 32-acre parcel, including the toxic site, in late 1980 to Coastal Equities, a real estate investment firm that said it would develop the property for new homes.

But Coastal Equities moved into involuntary bankruptcy in late 1981, and its top five executives were convicted of fraud for bilking their investors. Coastal Equities’ trustees denied any liability for the toxic mess, while the Chathams said they could not afford to undertake the cleanup because of money owed them by the bankrupt firm.

Smith said Friday that the state no longer holds Coastal Equities--which still owns the property--responsible for the cleanup because the trustee paid the state $10,000 to help defray the cost and provided, on the property deed, access to the site.

Smith said the state may still identify other parties that should share in the cost of the cleanup, including trucking and disposal firms that may have dumped hazardous waste on the site.

Both Smith and county officials expressed delight that the cleanup process has reached this stage.

“There is relief, hope and joy because, from this day on, this is only the first of many kinds of orders we will begin issuing around the state,” Smith said. “Those of us in this business are overjoyed that things are beginning to happen, and we’re really going to move forward.”

Larry Aker, who heads the hazardous materials program for the county Department of Health Services and who has pursued the Chatham cleanup issue for four years, said a conclusion to the case is finally in sight.

“For the first time, the state has the clout of $2.5 million, so the moment there is a lack of compliance, the state can let a contract who can pick up at that point and do all the work that is required. We know that we are finally moving forward.”

Neither the Chathams nor their attorney could be reached for comment Friday.