EPA, city get started on improving communication

A changing of the guard has reopened the lines of communication between the City of Libby and the Environmental Protection Agency.

Newly appointed mayor Doug Roll and the City Council hosted an informal public meeting with EPA officials, including the new Libby team leader Victor Ketellapper.

The meeting was requested by Community Advisory Group member D.C. Orr at the Dec. 1 city council meeting in response to the use of Operable Unit 1, which is a 13-acre parcel that includes Riverfront Park and the old export plant.

EPA officials and council members agreed that planning needed to be coordinated. The EPA has proposed to cap a 7-acre section of OU 1 while the city has entertained ideas for a community park and has plans to construct a new water line in the unit.  

“We want the city on board … want you to say, ‘these plans mesh.’ We need to coordinate with the city so remedies put in place are compatible with future use,” Ketellapper said.

“(We) don’t want to have (EPA) come in and say, ‘this is what we are going to do,’” Roll said. “We need to solve it before it gets contentious.”

At last Wednesday’s meeting Roll expressed concern with the EPA regularly changing leadership.

“We hate not to trust anyone,” Roll said. “The EPA keeps changing, so what’s binding? A lot of promises have been made over the years.”

Roll said some Libby residents were upset because of agreements made and not kept. Roll proposed that future agreements need to be in writing and signed. 

Russ Leclerc, EPA remedial project manager said, “We can’t work in a vacuum in our offices in Denver. We need to work hand-in-hand and make good decisions.”

Both parties expressed the need to cooperate and were not sure how or why there was a communication breakdown. In the past few years, the council has had little representation at the EPA monthly meetings.

“We have, over time, about the last year we have had hardly any meetings with (EPA) and we fell out of the loop on a lot of this,” Roll said.

City supervisor Dan Thede has attended Operations and Maintenance meetings, though Roll said the information is not making it back to the council.

The Community Advisory Group hosted its monthly meeting the following evening, with no representative from the city in attendance.

Leclerc also addressed Roll’s concerns with leadership turnover and said Ketellapper would not go anywhere.

Ketellapper, who has been on the job a little over two weeks, said he is developing plans for 2009 and beyond. He said it is a transition period from removal to remedial, from emergency response to long-range planning.

The change in response strategy utilizes a Record of Decision in which the EPA describes site cleanup plans. A public comment period is involved in the ROD as well.

He also noted the move from quantitative – assessments using hard numbers – to qualitative – where risks are not put into numbers – for most operable units.

The exception is OU 4, a residential unit that will retain quantitative analysis. Ketellapper said a detailed risk assessment will be introduced in 2009, with cleanup strategies and management tools put in place for the potential of future asbestos findings.

The public was allowed a three-minute window to address the council but not allowed to ask questions.

Orr warned the council that the “EPA is going to leave the city with liabilities. The council needs to work proactive and cover your rears.”

Orr agreed with Roll’s request for agreements to come in writing and quoted the late Ronald Reagan, “Trust but verify. Get everything in writing.”