Butte still waiting for EPA to bring ‘sunshine’ to Butte Hill cleanup agreement

Montana Standard (Butte)

March 26--It's been two months exactly since the Environmental Protection Agency announced it would petition U.S. District Judge Sam Haddon to "bring sunshine" to the agreement in principle reached on the Butte Hill cleanup, but so far, the agency has not done so.

The EPA's Region 8 Denver office said via email they expect a motion to be filed within a few weeks.

After 12 years of wrangling, the EPA, the state, and all of the responsible parties arrived at a verbal agreement on Jan. 25. Many insiders to the process credited both EPA Region 8 administrator Doug Benevento and state budget director Dan Villa for finessing a deal that no one before them had been able to broker -- despite over a decade of trying -- with all of the parties involved.

During a public meeting on Jan. 26, Benevento announced the deal. He also told the standing-room-only crowd at the Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives that the EPA and all the parties had agreed to ask Haddon to lift the gag order on the agreement so the EPA could come forward with at least some detail of exactly what the negotiators had decided.

Butte-Silver Bow County attorney Mollie Maffei said of the delay that "these things do take time."

"The parties have been working on the different aspects of the agreement," Maffei said. "We're continuing to move forward."

Maffei cautioned that because of the gag order, she couldn't say too much. The Montana Standard and Silver Bow Creek Headwaters Coalition sued the EPA in 2016 in the hopes of lifting the gag order completely. The Standard and the coalition lost their suit.

Haddon heard that case. He said at the time that the Standard did not "offer a single justifiable reason" for the fact that it had waited 13 years to intervene. Haddon signed the gag order, established between the EPA and the primary responsible party, Atlantic Richfield Company, in 2003.

But this time, the EPA and all the parties are in agreement the gag order should be lifted, Benevento said in late January.

Maffei said that before the parties can petition Haddon, everyone "wants to make sure we're on the same page on the big principles" of the agreement. Besides the EPA, the parties involved include two state agencies, Atlantic Richfield, the county, and the railroads.

"We want to make sure concepts we had agreed upon were what we thought. It just takes a while. There are so many parties and different aspects to it," Maffei said.

The EPA's Denver office commented through email.

"Most of (the) tasks are complete, and the group is now actively working on a motion to modify the confidentiality order as well as informational materials for public presentation," EPA Denver office spokesperson Rich Mylott wrote.

Benevento said during the late January public meeting it could be spring or even summer before Haddon's order would be relaxed.

Maffei said that once the motion has reached Haddon's desk, she expects things will begin moving fast.

"Things will start happening pretty quick here once we get this motion done," Maffei said. "EPA will start releasing some things and have public meetings."

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