City faces $46,000 fine

City faces $46,000 fine
By KATI BEXLEY
kati.bexley@staugustinerecord.com
Publication Date: 11/22/06


The Florida Department of Environmental Protection has proposed that the city of St. Augustine be fined more than $46,000 for dumping materials from an old landfill into a borrow pit on Holmes Boulevard.

Also, the consent orders have a litany of recommendations to clean and assess contamination at the sites that could cost the city more than $250,000, John Regan, city chief operations officer, said Tuesday. He said the money will come from the city's general fund.

"The city's plan is to be highly responsive to (Environmental Protection)," he said.

The agency sent two draft consent orders to the city this week of its findings in the criminal investigation of the dumping.

In January, the city took 20,000 cubic yards of material from an old landfill on Riberia Street and placed it in a borrow pit on an 80-acre site on Holmes Boulevard.

Jill Johnson, Environmental Protection spokeswoman, said Tuesday that the criminal investigation has been closed due to lack of evidence.

Regan was out of the office for the Thanksgiving holiday and said he had not reviewed the documents well enough to give thorough comments.

Bill Harriss, city manager, was also out of the office for Thanksgiving and did not return a call for comment.

The consent order on the Holmes Boulevard site says there are contaminants in the soil, sediment and groundwater in the area the Riberia Street materials were dumped.

Environmental Protection found elevated levels of arsenic, vinyl chloride and thalium, a metal similar to arsenic, that violate the state's water quality standards, Johnson said. The report also says the contaminants could "reasonably cause pollution of the surface water and/or further pollution of the ground water."

Ever since Environmental Protection sent a warning letter to the city on March 15 about the dumping the city has been forthcoming about its "errors."

The materials put into the borrow pit came from a 3.35-acre salt marsh creation project at the end of Riberia Street, Regan has said. The city is restoring wetlands at the Riberia site and it needed to remove the material promptly so seasonal trees could be planted, he has said.

Regan said Tuesday that the city was not surprised by the penalties, but it will "evaluate the monetary amount to see if they agree with it."

The city has 30 days to reply to the consent orders. Johnson said they are used as a negotiation tool and are considered drafts until signed by both the city and Environmental Protection.

Regan said the city will meet with William Pence, the city's environmental attorney of Akerman and Senterfitt in Orlando, and GeoSyntec Consultants, of Jacksonville, next week to review the consent orders.

"We want to do what's fair to (Environmental Protection) and to the city," he said.

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