It’s outrageous — again.
After a hiatus of 16 years, the Lowry Landfill Superfund issue has raised its ugly head once again, with the taxpayers of Denver, Lakewood, Englewood and Littleton potentially being asked to pay for damages caused by some of the largest corporations in the U.S.
In the early ’90s, cities across the country were forced to defend themselves for contributing municipal solid waste, typically relatively benign, to landfills. Ironically, Littleton and Englewood were following the recommendation of the Environmental Protection Agency and the state health department when they sent sewage sludge to Lowry.
At the site, the landfill’s owner (the city and county of Denver) and its operator (Waste Management) followed the old philosophy that “the solution to pollution is dilution.” They mixed the cities’ large volume of relatively clean sludge with highly toxic waste from manufacturing giants such as Adolph Coors, Syntex Chemicals, S.W. Shattuck Chemical, Conoco, Shell Oil, Asamera Oil and others.
Later, when the landfill began to leak toxins, the industries came after the cities, seeking to force taxpayers to shoulder untold millions of dollars in liability. As one captain of industry said to me, “We can’t raise our prices to pay for cleanup. But you can just raise your taxes.”
The nation’s cities fought back vigorously. In 1990, I became the main spokesperson for municipalities that were unfairly caught up in the landfill liability mess, testifying before congressional subcommittees and crisscrossing the country to argue the cities’ case.
In the metro area, after years of wrangling, Littleton and Englewood settled with Denver and Waste Management, paying a relatively small amount to be freed of the threat of millions of dollars in liability.
Fast forward to today. At Superfund sites, there typically are two legal phases: a “remediation” (cleanup) phase, followed by a phase to assess “natural resource damages.” With cleanup almost completed at Lowry, the state attorney general has called for the beginning of the second phase. In this phase, the state is expected to employ experts to evaluate what damage, if any, the site has caused to the air, water, wildlife, surrounding land values, etc.
To its credit, Denver has attempted to bring together all parties to conduct a cooperative assessment with the state. Instead, the industries involved have formed their own group to negotiate potential liability.
The bad news is that the state is continuing the egregious principal that cities share responsibility for contamination at Lowry Landfill. Instead, the state should be pursuing the “polluter-pay” principal. In this case, the polluters are the industries that contributed solvents, oil and other dangerous manufacturing byproducts to the landfill.
In contrast, the sewage sludge contributed by the Littleton/Englewood Waste Water Treatment Plant is so benign that it has received major awards from the EPA. It’s so clean that today it is spread as fertilizer on fields in eastern Colorado, where it helps to grow the wheat that makes our breakfast toast. If only municipal solid waste had been deposited at Lowry, the landfill would never have become a Superfund site.
No one knows yet what, if any, “damages” to natural resources may eventually be found at the landfill. The cities may once again opt to use scarce taxpayer dollars to settle with the state, believing settlement may be the least expensive approach.
That may make the most financial sense. But forcing taxpayers to pay for contamination of the landfill by industry is still an outrage.
Susan Thornton (smthornton@aol.com) served 16 years on the Littleton City Council, including eight years as mayor.
