Cleanup plans proposed for contaminated Miller Plating site

Sept. 17--Cleanup of contaminated soil and water at the former Miller Plating & Metal Finishing site in Evansville could cost more than $1 million, according to Indiana Department of Environmental Management records.

An environmental consultant's report identified four options for cleaning up the property, including estimated costs. The report recommends treating the polluted site by mixing in chemical soil additives to degrade the contaminant, mostly the industrial solvent TCE, to safe levels.

The estimated cost would be $494,000 to $1 million and would be borne by a former insurer of the property.

However, the cleanup has been delayed by additional testing needed to confirm the extent of contamination, according to state officials.

In the meantime, pits of murky water, piles of building debris, plastic parts, broken glass and rusty metal remain hidden among shoulder-high weeds on the seven-acre lot, with no fence and open to the surrounding neighborhood.

The site at the corner of North Sixth Avenue and Allens Lane is in a low-income corner of the city's Fifth Ward. It was abandoned by former Evansville businessman Dan Stocks who owned a majority share of the bankrupt company when it closed in 2007.

In addition to leaving behind a mess of hazardous chemicals and contaminated ground, the company, MPMF Realty, LLC, left unpaid property taxes which now amount to $1,091,934, according to the Vanderburgh County Treasurer's Office. That would be the minimum bid needed to buy liens on the three adjoining parcels that make up the Miller Plating site at the county's annual tax sale on Friday . Miller Plating has been in every tax sale since 2010 without a buyer, and the county also has declined to take title.

A 2015 Courier & Press investigation of the contaminated site found that Stocks has since moved to Florida. In February, a judge ruled Stocks was personally liable for more than $2 million in loans taken out against mortgages on the Miller Plating property. Stocks could not be reached for comment.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency spent $1.4 million to remove thousands of gallons of dangerous, precariously stored chemicals from the site, as well as contaminated wastewater and sludge, and its buildings were demolished.

Now IDEM is working with an environmental consultant and an insurance company to cleanup the below-ground contamination.

Among the environmental concerns on the Miller Plating property are areas of heavy chromium contamination, as well as the industrial solvent TCE and other volatile organic chemicals, according to IDEM.

Soil contamination there is above safe levels for both residential and industrial contact, according to IDEM, and the groundwater is contaminated above both safe drinking standards and also the standard for vapor intrusion -- what happens when contaminated groundwater evaporates and enters a building exposing people to hazardous chemicals.

Additional testing was ordered by IDEM in March to better understand if the pollution extended off site. The tests did not find vapor contamination above safe residential levels in homes north of the site, said Barry Sneed, an IDEM spokesman. Contamination levels in vapors were above safe residential levels in an area of ground between the site and a neighboring commericial building. However, those levels were below safe commercials levels.

Sneed said a second round of testing is needed to confirm those results.

The most expensive of the four cleanup alternatives identified by consultant Ramboll Environ would be excavating the contaminated soil for an estimated cost of $1.2 million to $2.6 million. It would involved removing contaminated soil and disposing of it in a hazardous waste landfill, possibly even incinerating some of it.

Earlier this year, IDEM project manager Nicolette Morris said it is expected that cleanup will make the site attractive to redevelopment.

However, the city may not have a ready means of facilitating redevelopment at the site once it is cleaned up.

"As far as development post clean up, of course we would like to see all vacant property redeveloped," said Kelley Coures, executive director of Evansville's Department of Metropolitan Development.

But Coures said because the Miller Plating site is not in "a defined, declared redevelopment area" it is not under his department's authority. In addition, he said the Evansville Brownfield Corporation also is not in a position to help.

"The Brownfield Corporation is currently acting as the Land Bank but it is limited to residential property only. Brownfield has no budget and no funding to acquire or maintain that property," Coures said.

The term "brownfield," is defined by the EPA as a property where redevelopment "may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant or contaminant" -- a definition adopted by Indiana and other states.

The Evansville Brownfields Corporation, a non-profit partner to the Department of Metropolitan Development, was created for that use in 2003 with a mission statement to "acquire brownfield and environmentally distressed properties" in the city to aid in economic development.

However, it has shifted its focus to working with the city to acquire and redevelopment blighted housing.

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