Wrong time zone. The site I'm talking about is about 20 miles from me. I've read everything in the papers and on the internet and it amazes me just how wrong all of it is. All one needs to do is talk with the local people and you quickly get a real sense as to what's going on. Basically if the EPA turns a site into a superfund site then everybody connected to that site gets brought in as a defendant. Because the tailings were sold as a product they are not classified as toxic waste. That means that everybody who has any of it on their property, whether it's gravel on their drive, a rock on display, or stone in their leach field is now on the hook because they are the end user. By EPA rules if they declare it toxic then the end user must pay to clean it up, they become the waste generator, and they own the waste for life. It's up to the defendants to prove that their stone did not come from the superfund site.
If the homeowners can't, how do you prove where the stone you bought 30 years ago came from, then they are forced to pay. Think about it, stone from the ground that could have come from a different pit not far away that's the same stone is automatically assumed to have come from the mine. Once they were informed just how badly the government was going to screw them they voted no. It wasn't even close. In one town it was something like 97% of the voters. The other was a little closer only because they also included using the land to build a new plant (nothing to do with Asbestos).
I like clean air and water and I don't want to see the EPA done away with. But it has gotten political and people now fear it. Nobody should fear the government's help. What I told you is not some odd ball case, it's closer to the norm. A local rail road got a huge fine because someone left three 55 gallon drums of kerosene in a box car. It had never been used and it was tracked down to being left there from 1967. The EPA called it waste and fined them over a half million dollars. The federal court just rubber stamped the determination of the EPA and nearly bankrupted the railroad. Since it's owned by the employees they took massive cuts just to keep the doors open. Last summer a gas station found out that back in 1950 something the land was the site of a laundrymat and cleaning chemicals were in the ground. The building had to be leveled and all the dirt removed as toxic waste. The owner was a large fuel distributor but it cost them millions. This happens all the time. If you honestly don't believe that stuff like this doesn't go through the heads of businessmen as they decide "stay in the US or move the company offshore" then I don't know what to say.
Okay let's change time zones to Eden/Lowell Vermont. I think one thing that scared the residents was a Politician.( Representative Mark Higley of Lowell told local residents that he feared the EPA would focus on asbestos fill offsite rather than the tailings at the mine site. An anonymous resident told the press that he feared the EPA would “sit on the site” for 10 to 15 years before starting the clean up. Higley also warned residents that once placed on the Superfund list, it’s impossible to be removed from it.)
Another probably had to do with civil liability and who could sue and who could be sued. Another was property values and the civil liability that would attach if someone knowingly sold property that contained a toxic hazardous material.
One can only provide factual accurate information. If people elect to ignore and discount the information then they have only themselves to blame when disaster strikes.
Vermont:
Eden/Lowell Town Meeting:
Eden resident Leslie White held a research-filled notebook as she voiced disapproval of a proposal to have the former asbestos mine site in Lowell and Eden declared a federal Superfund site, as one of the most polluted locations in the country.
A developer is interested in building a wood biomass power plant there, but to do that, the site has to be cleaned up.
The Vermont Asbestos Group Mine, inactive since the 1990s, sits on about 1,550 acres on Belvidere Mountain within both Eden and Lowell.
Town-meeting voters in both towns will decide next month whether to endorse the Superfund request.
“We have to be careful about what we say yes to,” White said.“People can promise anything. A 10-year window to clean up the mine probably isn’t accurate.”
Last summer, Vermont Agency of Natural Resources officials argued that federal money is essential to cleaning up the tailings from the mine. The main concern is asbestos debris invading the local watershed.
Townspeople who attended meetings about the Superfund proposal last summer opposed the idea, fearing their property values would drop.
“We are not sick from airborne fibers,” White said. “Asbestos fibers are part of our ecology here in northern Vermont. Let’s accept it and move on.”
Whitcomb scoffed at projections that the cleanup project would provide jobs while pumping money into the local economy.
“It would only give federal employees more jobs,” Whitcomb said. “We don’t need any more superfunds. The country is broke. In 10 years, we’ll be as bad off financially as Greece.”
March 14, 2012
Eden/Lowell, Vermont - Last Tuesday, voters in the towns of Lowell and Eden, Vermont rejected a proposition that would have declared the Vermont Asbestos Group mine site – formerly referred to as the Belvedere Mines – a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site, providing funding to clean up the piles of asbestos tailings from the now defunct mine.
According to various Associated Press reports, the resolutions were re-soundly defeated in both locales. In Eden, the vote was 3 in favor and 106 opposed. In Lowell, 38 voted in favor of the Superfund designation while 103 voted against it. Experts surmise that the positive vote in Lowell was a little higher because there were plans in place to build a biomass plant at the site.
The Belvedere Asbestos Mines were long shared by the two municipalities as Belvedere Mountain straddles the two towns. Before the vote, Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin told the press he would not support the Superfund designation unless both towns were in favor of it.
Representative Mark Higley of Lowell told local residents that he feared the EPA would focus on asbestos fill offsite rather than the tailings at the mine site. An anonymous resident told the press that he feared the EPA would “sit on the site” for 10 to 15 years before starting the clean up. Higley also warned residents that once placed on the Superfund list, it’s impossible to be removed from it.
Most residents simply worried about a decline in property values and many believe there are no health risks from the piles, even though experts have long known that airborne asbestos fibers that are inhaled can enter the lung area and cause tumors to form, resulting in an eventual diagnosis of asbestosis, pleural mesothelioma, and other cancers.
One Selectman from Lowell, Alden Warner, told residents he was in favor of the designation, saying the town should consider the future health of their children and grandchildren.
Read more:
Vermont Towns Vote Against Superfund Designation | Mesothelioma Cancer Alliance News
