Escondido : State Contractor to Assess, Plan Chatham Cleanup

A state contractor has been hired to determine how best to assess, once and for all, the level of contamination at the Chatham Brothers toxic waste site here, and cleanup of the tainted six-acre parcel may begin within 90 days, officials said Wednesday.

The news comes 3 1/2 years after the county first discovered the site, which came to be characterized as potentially the most dangerous toxic dump in San Diego County, in part because it was unknown just how contaminated the site is.

The parcel, on the southwest corner of Gamble Lane and Bernardo Avenue on the southwest edge of the city, was for 35 years the site of a chemical solvent recycling operation, oil drum storage area and hazardous waste trucking yard operated by two brothers, Robert and Thomas Chatham. The men have refused to clean the site and will be sued by the state to recover the cost of the operation, officials say.

The site becomes the first in California to be targeted for a share of $100 million authorized by voters in November, 1984, to be spent for the cleanup of toxic waste sites around the state.

Officials estimate that the Chatham site will cost about $2.55 million to clean up.

Larry Aker, who heads the hazardous materials program for the county’s Department of Health Services, said the Chatham site was the first in the state to receive cleanup funds, not because it was the biggest or the worst site, but because its cleanup “is the most do-able.”

Tetra Tech, a Pasadena company under contract with the state’s Department of Health Services, was hired to devise a plan on how best to determine the type and levels of contamination and to suggest ways to clean it up.

That proposal will go to the state for review by June 10, and the state has given itself a 30-day review period to look at the Tetra Tech proposal and make its own suggestions. If changes are made, Tetra Tech will be given another 10 days to amend its report.

Once Tetra Tech’s site characterization and cleanup plan is prepared, the state will award a separate contract to do the actual site analysis and cleanup, Aker said.