PORT ANGELES — Clallam County would reimburse the federal Environmental Protection Agency $165,485 for the 2010 cleanup of contaminated soil at the former Salt Creek firing range under a proposed settlement.
The U.S. Department of Justice published April 28 notice of a proposed consent decree under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act.
Public comment will be taken on the proposal through May 30. The decree would come into effect at some point after that.
The civil complaint was filed in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington to recover the $827,425 cost of removing lead, copper and zinc from an old target range that the U.S. Army built west of Port Angeles in 1942.
The firing range sits on the eastern edge of the Salt Creek Recreation Area, a popular Clallam County park, and includes land owned by the state Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
It was conveyed from the U.S. Army to the Coast Guard in 1950 and reconveyed to Clallam County and DNR in 1958 and 1959.
The firing range was used by the Coast Guard, Washington National Guard and civilian shooting groups through 1968.
“It was really a good thing that it got cleaned up,” said Josey Paul, the county resident who pushed local, state and federal governments to remove harmful lead from the shooting range.
“There was a massive amount of lead at the old range that hadn’t been cleaned up.
“That lead was spreading off that site and down to the woods,” Paul added in a Tuesday interview.
“EPA determined that that was a risk, not just to wildlife but to the people using the park.”
Lead can damage neurological functions if ingested. It concentrates in mushrooms, Paul said.
Under the terms of the settlement, Clallam County will pay $165,485, DNR will pay $74,468 and the Washington National Guard will pay $8,274 to the EPA.
The federal government will pay the remaining $579,198 on behalf of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Coast Guard.
The settlement resolves the three named defendants of further liability.
Clallam County Civil Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Kristina Nelson-Gross, who helped negotiate the settlement, briefed county commissioners on the consent decree in a Feb. 1 work session.
Commissioners approved the expenditure Feb. 9.
“We have it budgeted in the risk management fund,” County Administrator Jim Jones said Tuesday.
In October 2010, EPA contractors removed 1 to 2 feet of topsoil from a 70-foot-by-100-foot section of the old firing range, including the berm where targets were set up.
The material was hauled to a hazardous waste disposal site near Arlington, Ore.
“They would have gotten the vast bulk of it,” Paul said.
“They got basically the mother lode contributing to the lead spreading.”
Paul added that EPA officials “moved really fast” after high concentrations of lead were found in an on-site study.
In February, Nelson-Gross told commissioners that the federal government would pay no more than 70 percent of the cleanup costs.
EPA agreed to waive two years of interest owed by the county, DNR and Washington National Guard, she said.
“This was a settlement that we think that everybody can live with,” Nelson-Gross said in the Feb. 1 work session.
“Everyone else has agreed to sign off. We are one of the last remaining signers of this.”
Publication of the proposed consent decree initiated a 30-day public comment period that ends May 30.
During the comment period, the proposed consent decree can be viewed at the Justice Department website: www.justice.gov/enrd/consent-decrees.
Public comments should be addressed to the assistant attorney general, Environment and Natural Resources Division, and should refer to United States v. Clallam County, Washington, et al., D.J. Ref. No. 90-11-3-10945.
Comments can be submitted by email to pubcomment-ees.enrd@usdoj.gov or by mail to Assistant Attorney General, U.S. DOJ-ENRD, P.O. Box 7611, Washington, DC 20044-7611.
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56450, or at rollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
