EPA Drops 1,400 From Superfund Inquiry in Valley

In a decision hailed as a boon to business, federal officials Friday cleared more than 1,400 property and business owners once suspected of leaking chemical pollutants into San Fernando Valley ground water supplies, erasing the threat of costly participation in a massive Superfund cleanup program.

Environmental Protection Agency officials said their action will remove the legal cloud that has been hanging over businesses since the EPA identified thousands of potentially responsible parties for the estimated $300-million cost of cleaning up contaminated underground water in North Hollywood, Burbank and Glendale.

Because the broad Superfund law can apply to past, present and future owners and tenants of affected properties, many owners had complained of being put in an economic stranglehold.

“We saw that a cloud was forming over the local economy,” said Keith Takata, deputy director of the Superfund project for the EPA’s western regional office in San Francisco. “People were having trouble selling their property or getting loans, and because of all these troubles their property values were dropping.”

Through soil sampling and other methods, the EPA found that the 1,406 parties being removed from the list were not responsible for the water contamination that has plagued the area for years and forced the shutdown of municipal water wells.

So far, the EPA has named 126 parties it believes are responsible, Takata said. Included in that tally are firms such as Lockheed Corp. that have reached settlements with the EPA requiring contributions to the cleanup.

But more than 2,100 businesses and landowners are still being investigated and it may be months--or years--before the agency determines exactly which parties will be held accountable for tainting the area’s underground water.

There are four Superfund water cleanup sites in the Valley--North Hollywood, Burbank and two in Glendale--all located in areas where aircraft, auto and other heavy manufacturing businesses have been located over the past 50 years. The EPA has found volatile organic compounds in underground water pockets there, including chemicals such as trichloroethylene, a suspected carcinogen.

The agency mailed notices Friday to property owners and businesses that were cleared of responsibility.

The EPA characterized the action as a boost for the San Fernando Valley economy.

David Goodreau, chairman of the California Industrial Leadership Council and an advocate for small manufacturing businesses targeted by Superfund, agreed.

“Those taken off the list can start to recover from the stress now,” Goodreau said. “Many of the businesses were concerned over whether their company would survive the ordeal. Now their attention can be focused back where it should be, on their businesses. The Superfund process has had a huge psychological effect, and I think there will be a huge sigh of relief.”

Goodreau urged the EPA to quickly reach a decision on the fate of 2,157 parties still under investigation.

The agency has taken political heat in recent months from the new Republican-controlled U.S. Congress, which has proposed cutting its budget from $4.9 billion to $2.3 billion and the Superfund toxic-cleanup program’s budget by 33%, from $1.5 billion to $1 billion.

Rep. Carlos Moorhead (R-Glendale) has said that several businesses have complained about the high costs associated with the project, and he intervened last year when several Burbank manufacturers were embroiled in a dispute with Lockheed Corp. over responsibility for the cleanup. But Moorhead said Friday that he was not aware of any political pressure being exerted to get the EPA to back off affected businesses.

“When I contacted [the EPA] last year, I explained that many of these people didn’t have any money or even the first idea in the world how to defend themselves,” he said. “[The EPA] said they would do what they could to work out a fair solution, but nobody ever put any pressure on them.”

The types of businesses released from liability Friday varied widely, from light manufacturing and photofinishing to auto repair and graphics studios. Several firms said they felt confident all along that they would not be liable for cleanup costs.

“We’ve never used the type of chemicals they’re talking about,” said Frank Gibbs, president of Ryan Herco Inc., an aircraft parts company in Burbank. “From our standpoint, the Superfund process has had little effect on us or our customers.”

But Goodreau said several companies have been hit hard. One company that remains on the EPA’s investigation list has spent more than $70,000 in legal fees and soil sampling, he said.

“Many of the people on that list were very small, Mom-and-Pop businesses,” echoed Burbank Mayor David Golonski. “Just the costs to protect themselves may have been enough to put some of them out of business, so those who have been delisted will be greatly relieved.”

Cleanup efforts at the Valley’s four Superfund sites are at various stages of the process. In Glendale, design work is expected to be completed this year on a water-treatment plant that will enable Glendale to reopen about 10 underground wells. So far, 25 companies have agreed to split the $4-million construction cost, including the Walt Disney Co. and Lockheed.

In North Hollywood, where a small treatment plant has been operating since 1989, the EPA is negotiating with some firms and has sued others to recoup $17.2 million spent on the treatment system and the wider investigation of the area’s ground-water pollution.

In Burbank, construction is complete on a large, $200-million ground-water treatment system built by Lockheed under an agreement with the EPA. Lockheed had earlier threatened to sue about 50 companies if they would not help pay for the work, but the aerospace giant recently reached a settlement with most of those firms, said Pierce O’Donnell, an attorney for the company.

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The Search for Polluters

Federal officials Friday cleared more than 1,400 businesses and property owners of polluting ground water in North Hollywood, Burbank and Glendale, leaving 2,157 more still suspected. The EPA is trying to collect part of the $300 million cleanup cost from polluters, 126 of which have been identified so far.

The EPA is investigating 3,689 potential sources of pollution. The status:

Being investigated: 58%

Dropped: 38%

Alleged Polluters: 4%

Source: Environmental Protection Agency