Comment Archives: Last 7 Days
Re: “Green Investment Group tries to fend off Superfund designation at Frenchtown mill”
See also....
Toxic Mess: EPA places former Missoula Co papermill on National Priorities List
By Matthew Koehler, May 22, 2013
Source: https://ncfp.wordpress.com/2013/05/22/toxi…
On March 12, 2011, the Missoulian reported that “Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. officials say they’ve already cleaned up their Frenchtown paper mill.” The article went on to quote Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. spokeswoman Lisa Esneault:
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“When we discontinued operations at the Missoula mill more than a year ago, we developed a detailed strategy for removing all residual process materials subject to environmental regulation. We discussed our plans with the (Montana Department of Environmental Quality) at that time and have since implemented all activities as promised. This work is now complete and we believe all environmental issues at the mill have been appropriately addressed.”
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Well, today, Missoula County residents woke up to the news that:
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"The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed placing Frenchtown’s old paper mill site on the National Priorities List, a step closer to triggering a Superfund cleanup effort.
The former Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. mill has evidence of dioxin, furan, arsenic and manganese contamination on portions of its 3,200-acre grounds. An NPL listing would allow more testing to confirm the extent of the problem and research of the plant’s history to determine which former or current owners might bear financial responsibility for fixing it.
“This isn’t a taxpayer-paid program,” Missoula County environmental health supervisor Peter Nielsen said Tuesday. “It’s paid for by the parties that profited from the operation, sale or closure of that mill. They’re brought back to the table to pay for the messes they’ve left behind. That’s where we’re headed, and that’s what we felt all along is what should happen.”
Current property owners Frenchtown Technology and Industrial Center did not respond to phone and email requests for comment on the EPA announcement. Previously, company redevelopment manager Ray Stillwell told the Missoulian he hoped the site could avoid a federal listing by managing its own cleanup efforts."
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It’s worth remembering that the Smurfit-Stone Container Corp was one of the original “timber partners” (along with Montana Wilderness Association, National Wildlife Federation and Montana Trout Unlimited) that was part of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge Partnership’s proposal for 100,000 acres of politically mandated national forest logging, which later became part of Sen Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act.
It’s also worth remembering that the Smurfit-Stone Container paper mill closed on December 31, 2009, the very same day the Black Liquor Tax Credit loophole expired, which was much more than a coincidence. During 2009, Smurfit-Stone Corporation collected $654 million from US taxpayers utilizing this “black liquor tax credit” boondoggle. All told, the U.S. Pulp and Paper industry took $6.5 billion from U.S. Taxpayers in 2009 under the black liquor boondoggle.
Well, it’s looking like the boondoggle will continue, since Smurfit-Stone Container Corporation executives apparently lied to Missoula County citizens and left Missoula County with a toxic mill site that will likely require federal EPA Superfund clean-up. But, hey, at least the Smufit-Stone executives got $50.4 million in bonuses during 2009, right?
Note: On May 27, 2011 Rock-Tenn Co completed it’s $3.5 billion takeover of Smurfit-Stone Container Corp. Rock-Tenn Co CEO and Chairman James A. Rubright is with the American Forest & Paper Association. Also, word has it that Smurfit-Stone was bankrupted and restructured before Rock-Tenn acquired and Rock-Tenn’s envio counsel became Rock-Tenn’s enviro VP. In other words, the assets, profits and subsidies are continuous, but not the liabilities.
Re: “Party Planning Committee, June 17-23”
Weeknight out of NYC is playing The Blind Shake + Outer Minds + Magpies show 6/20/13 --21+/$5 18+/$8 doors at 9P @VFW
6/19/13 doors at 9P Priests + La Font + Shahs + Copilot Eyedrops + Death Moths 21+ /$6 18+/ $8 @VFW
6/23/13 doors at 9P Jamaican Queens + Shahs + Jesse Williams + Adam Schulte 21+ $4//18+ $6 @VFW
Re: “Green Investment Group tries to fend off Superfund designation at Frenchtown mill”
…In a June 26, 1994, Cleveland Plain Dealer article entitled Environmentalists Leery of Possible Loopholes, Chris Trepal, co-director of the Earth Day Coalition in Northeast Ohio, lambasted the enabling VAP legislation as “one of the poorest public policy measures I’ve ever seen.” A clairvoyant Richard Sahli, executive director of the Ohio Environmental Council, echoed his sentiment in the May 26, 1994, Cincinnati Post, “We do predict there will be a lot of shoddy cleanups under this bill the state will never catch.” Testifying before the House Energy & Natural Resources Committee on behalf of the Ohio Academy of Trial Lawyers, Cincinnati environmental lawyer David Altman asserted, “This bill is a definite bait-and-switch. What it is supposed to do and what it does is two different things.”
A seminal, 152 page 2001 Gund Foundation funded study by the Green Environmental Council confirmed the critics’ predictions. A dearth of agency resources to provide meaningful regulatory oversight combined with the lack of a credible, established enforcement mechanism has rendered the feckless, industry aligned program toothless. “It’s a broken program – it doesn’t work,” declared the council’s Bruce Cornett in an interview with the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Both the Sierra Club and Ohio Citizen Action opposed the 2000 $400 million Clean Ohio state bond issue out of concern the fungible proceeds could be utilized to prop up the lame Voluntary Action Program and create a trojan horse polluters slush fund. “This is the governor’s attempt to whitewash his EPA,” charged Jane Forrest Redfern, environmental projects director for Ohio Citizen Action in a November 1, 2000, Cleveland Plain Dealer article. Dedicated professionals, veteran Ohio EPA bureaucrats attempted to rectify the problem. According to the October 4, 2000, Cleveland Plain Dealer, “EPA staffers who shared some of the environmentalists’ concerns, at one point launched a quiet but unsuccessful campaign to disband the program.”
For six years after the Voluntary Action Program’s 1996 implementation, the U.S. EPA refused to extend program participants federal immunity and threatened to decertify the Ohio EPA due to the VAP’s expansive, inhibiting secrecy provisions and tangible lack of transparency. In a brokered, bifurcated modification to the Ohio VAP that “frankly doesn’t make sense at all,” according to Ohio Public Interest Research Group director Amy Simpson (Akron Beacon Journal, February 24, 2001), an alternative “memorandum of agreement” VAP track with enhanced public access was crafted. Companies that elect the original, opaque, “classic” option, which conceals under an embargo the extent and nature of contamination, will not be afforded U.S. EPA liability insulation. “Why Ohio would want a two-headed monster is beyond me,” quipped the Ohio Environmental Council’s Jack Shaner. In SCA’s case, the jaundiced, green and incompliant wants to hide what you can’t see.
Mark Chesler
Oberlin, Ohio
Re: “Green Investment Group tries to fend off Superfund designation at Frenchtown mill”
Interested in learning more about the proposed Superfund designation at Smurfit-Stone?
Attend the Clark Fork Coalition's Walk and Talk this Thursday, June 20 at 12 noon.
http://www.clarkfork.org/programs/walks-and-talks.html
Re: “Our favorite wildfire and weather apps”
What about Metwit?
http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/id465075816?mt=8
Disclosure: I own this company.
Re: “Flash in the Pan”
Does the presence of GM alfalfa have anything to do with the massive (and mysterious) bee kill-off? I dunno, maybe there isn't enough alfalfa to cause something like that, but then again alfalfa isn't the only thing that's GM'd. Just a thought.
Re: “Flash in the Pan”
USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack, former governor of Io-way, is a wholly owned property of Monsanto; and the entire US Department of Agriculture prostitutes itself to industrial agri-business; and the Forest Service, even today, to industrial timber extraction.
Re: “Neighborhood surge”
So happy to see the North/Westside prospering I only wish you had included the Hellgate Rollergirls' headquarters in your article. They have worked hard for recognition in the community and have done very well in building a following all of whom contribute largely to the neighborhood bringing in people with beer and wine money and hungry bellies. Another big bout tonight which I will attend. Cheers!
Re: “Staffers at Partnership Health Center in Missoula allege harassment, wrongful discharge”
I have been going to PHC for over a year now and after reading the articles and comments I feel I have to comment . I have never heard any dentist/staff raise their voice at coworkers or patients in my time, and believe me I have had many appointments. I have had appointments with Dr. Jensen and Dr. Hollern and I have only seen nice professional behavior. I feel that people generally feel that PHC is a sub standard facility and that is far beyond the truth. They provide a service that is not appreciated as far as I am concerned.
Re: “The road to Taylor Swift”
@ John Tandy: If anything, I think the writer did a great job of expressing her gratitude for T-Swift, the gift of music, her daughter, and the entire experience. Are you sure you read the entire story?
Re: “Our favorite wildfire and weather apps”
The Weather Underground app has a fire layer in the map view.
Re: “The road to Taylor Swift”
Let me get this straight. You win a prize for FREE tickets to a concert that sold out in under three minutes. You get FREE hotel stay. You get a FREE ride from Montana to Utah. And all you can do is say how much of a torturous experience it was with the exception of the three hours of the concert. What an ungrateful snob. Wow!
Re: “Mixed palette”
Good thing nobody takes art seriously.
Hi ya, April.
Re: “Immigration”
This is sloppy reporting if ever there was. Jessica failed to mention that Judge Sherlock dismissed most of the plaintiffs from the case, agreeing with the state that their supposed injuries were purely speculative. She also failed to mention that Judge Sherlock was puzzled why the plaintiffs opposed the legislature's efforts to address their concerns with the law. Sherlock is no dummy -- he knows that Shahid's real motives haven't been to repair the law but to eliminate it outright. Shahid is spinning and Jessica swallowed it without question.
Re: “Mixed palette”
This painting is just typical Jew pornography, showing a disgusting little Niglet with his butt hanging out of his diaper and a bare-breasted white youth who appears happy to see it.
And for the record, only a fool would believe in the Holohoax. If the Jews wanted to have a legitimate gripe against Hitler and the Nazis, they ought to argue he should have used even MORE Zyclon-B and "Gas chambers," since doing so would have saved additional Jews by delousing their clothing thereby preventing the spread of the deadly disease Typhus.
The Nazi "gas chambers" SAVED hundreds of thousands of Jews. Hitler was obsessed with the safety and well-being of the Jews, it was in his best interest to look out for their well-being.
You want us to believe April Gaede is the bizarre one? Get real.
Re: “Game of raps”
Please check out Reconnaissance at wormwoodmt.bandcamp.com and check out The Orators soundcloud at soundcloud.com/the-orators . Thanks to the Indy for this lovely writeup!
Re: “Not alone”
Missoula has more empathy per citizen population than any place I have lived. However, many people here also have the "meanwell" disorder mostly only a problem when they get their reality confused thinking "should" is the same thing as is. As annoying as meanwells can be .... they are way better than meanies. Most of the various clueless souls with the good hearts learn eventually. You can ignore reality but it won't ignore you.
Re: “Neighborhood surge”
Glad I read this.....I thought they only sold homebrew making supplies. Now that I know they sell craft beers, I will check out the inside of it.
Glen B.
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Re: “Neighborhood surge”
It's worth mentioning that the Bike Doctor has been integral to the neighborhood surge taking place around the Toole-Spruce intersection. Really, when you think about it, through a lot of sweat equity and hard work the Bike Doctor has been a pioneering force for good for that specific part of town for years now with their expansive native gardens, bike jumps and community-oriented bike shop.