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2 of "Dirty Dozen" in Area
December 2, 2003 - Worcester Telegram &
Gazette
By John J.
Morgan, T&G Staff
BOSTON -
Two Central Massachusetts businesses were
named on the Toxics Action Center's annual "dirty dozen" list of polluters
in the state yesterday, but officials of those companies are saying the
citation is a bad rap.
"I can't believe
these guys are doing that to us," said James F. "Jeff" Crowley of
Wachusett Mountain Associates Inc. when he heard his company was on this
year's list.
"I fully expected to
hear about the typical smokestack heavy polluter-type company" when he
heard a radio news report about the list yesterday, he said. "It sounded
almost like a joke that we were included, because we have a good
environmental track record."
But not everyone
agrees with decisions to allow the company to expand the ski operations on
Wachusett Mountain. The expansion got under way this fall. After a
long-running legal battle and scaling back the size of the area to be
cleared for new trails, 8 acres of red oaks on the mountain were cut down
over the protest of some local residents and the Sierra Club.
"Wachusett Mountain
Associates is on the list because of what they are doing to a public
reservation," said
Toxics Action Center spokesman Jay Rasku.
Also saying he was
surprised to see his company on the list was Ben Harvey of E.L. Harvey and
Sons of Westboro, a company that has a large trash collection, recycling
and disposal business.
"We were surprised
because we feel we have done an excellent job on the things we do around
here," said Mr. Harvey. "I think our record and what we have done in the
state will speak for itself."
The company was cited
by the
Toxics Action Center over plans to expand its operations near the
Hopkinton-Westboro town line with three new buildings to sort and recycle
residential, commercial and demolition waste. Company officials said they
are expanding in the hope of helping to meet a state goal of allowing no
more than 20 percent of the waste going to landfills and incinerators to
be made up of recyclable materials.
The company's plans
also include construction of a new garage for its fleet of trucks.
Carol W. DeVeuve of
Hopkinton, a neighbor to the
Harvey facility, which has a closed landfill
on its property, said she wants the expansion stopped. She said the
project is taking place in a water protection overlay district and that
potential pollution from the closed landfill could threaten local drinking
water.
Controversy over the
plans was heightened earlier this year when it was found that wells,
installed when the landfill was closed to detect any leakage of pollutants
into underlying groundwater, had not been tested over a 10-year period.
Mr. Harvey conceded
that the wells should have been tested every year; he said they now are
being tested quarterly. While an initial set of tests found high pH levels
and benzene in the groundwater wells, a second round of tests has found no
pollution.
Mr. Harvey said that
neither the state Department of Environmental Protection nor the local
Board of Health took steps to make sure the testing of the wells was done
over that 10-year period. "The DEP and Board of Health should have been
pushing for the tests, but it fell through the cracks," Mr. Harvey said.
The selection for the
list comes as a harsh blow for the company, which has prided itself on
development of recycling systems for trash, and for easing the public
acceptance of recycling here during the 1990s. When some companies
resisted transition to recycling, E.L. Harvey was among the first to
promote recycling as a viable way to reduce the need for landfills and
incinerators.
At
Wachusett Mountain, company officials said they scaled back their
expansion plan after it was found that the larger original plan would
affect old growth forest.
"We compromised and
scaled it back ... from 19 to 8 acres," Mr. Crowley said of the expansion,
which was approved by the state, which owns the mountain.
Mr. Crowley notes
that some 300 acres of land in towns around the mountain in northern
Central Massachusetts have been protected through an open space fund that
receives a percentage of the revenues from the ski area operation.
In addition, he said,
the company has received citations from groups such as the Massachusetts
Audubon Society for energy saving steps it has taken.
Others cited on the
list were:
Aquatic Control
Technology and Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation for
plans to use the pesticide diquat bromide, a suspected carcinogen and
toxic pesticide, to treat weed growth in
Lake Cochituate in Natick, near town drinking
water wells.
Champion City
Recovery, over plans to expand a trash transfer station 300 feet from a
town drinking water supply.
Dominion Power, owner
of two nuclear power plants in
Connecticut, which the group claims are
damaging Long Island Sound, producing nuclear waste, and posing a
terrorism threat.
New England Sand and
Gravel of Framingham, where the group claims operations threaten area
drinking water supplies.
Gutierrez Co. of
Stoneham, for seeking approval to use public park land for a parking lots
for corporate offices being built in the middle of a large conservation
area.
New England Landfill
Solutions of Brockton, for a landfill-capping project residents claim has
brought large quantities of additional waste to the landfill causing
health threats and pollution for nearby residents.
RESCO Incinerator in
Saugus, for seeking to expand its incinerator operations after years of
emissions of toxic air pollutants.
TruGreen ChemLawn of
North Andover, for pushing residents to sign up for pesticide lawn
treatments in exchange for donations to local soccer leagues.
U.S. Navy and
Department of Defense, for maintaining toxic dumps at the South Weymouth
Naval Air Station that is home to 12 national Superfund sites that
residents fear have caused a host of disease threats to residents.
Valley Mill Corp. of
Pittsfield, for seeking to build a waste processing and transfer station
in a blue-collar neighborhood, which opponents claim would pollute their
neighborhood.
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