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EPA-NEW ENGLAND ANNOUNCES STRONG ENFORCEMENT RESULTS FOR 1999

Release Date: 01/19/2000
Contact Information: Amy Miller, EPA Press Office (617-918-1042)

BOSTON - The New England Office of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today announced record results in its enforcement program for Fiscal Year 1999, including more judicial referrals and administrative penalty actions than at any time in the past eight years. The agency's regional office initiated a total of 33 judicial referrals from its regulatory and Superfund programs and issued 90 administrative penalty actions, both significant increases over 1998.

EPA also posted a banner year in negotiating innovative environmental projects - activities not required by law - in settling enforcement cases. Nearly $7.7 million of supplemental environmental improvements were funded last year through enforcement settlements, a record year for the region and a three-fold jump from the $2.2 million in projects funded in 1998.

EPA-New England's enforcement efforts required $202 million of expenditures by violators to come into compliance. These investments - 16 percent higher than in 1998 - are providing environmental benefits all across New England.

"This year's enforcement report shows that EPA-New England is not willing to stand by while irresponsible companies pollute our land, water and air," said Mindy S. Lubber, acting regional administrator at EPA's New England Office. "The report also supports our strategy combining strict enforcement, aggressive compliance assistance and innovative technologies for creating a cleaner, healthier environment."

EPA's enforcement efforts in New England last year continued to focus on large complex cases, which lead to the most significant environmental or public health impacts and have the greatest deterrent value.

Among the most noteworthy cases:

• Pfizer Inc.: EPA-New England reached final settlement of a judicial case involving Pfizer Inc's alleged hazardous waste, wastewater and community right-to-know violations at the pharmaceutical manufacturer's facility in Groton, Conn. Pfizer paid a penalty of $625,000 and agreed to perform two supplemental projects that go beyond the requirements of the law. Pfizer agreed to work with the University of Rhode Island on better management of wastes produced in its university labs, including pollution prevention, and to train teachers throughout Connecticut about managing wastes in high school labs.
• Northeast Utilities: Efforts by EPA-New England led a federal court to order two subsidiaries of Northeast Utilities to pay $10 million for 25 felony counts of violating the Clean Water Act at two power plants in Connecticut and for making false statements to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Of the $10 million in penalties, the defendants agreed to spend $3.3 million for specified local programs, including $1 million to help Connecticut towns purchase riverfront land for conservation to public parks and $650,000 to endow an environmental clinic at the University of Connecticut's School of Engineering.

We also continued our emphasis on "carrots and sticks," linking enforcement with compliance assistance, and focusing these efforts on specific industry and geographic sectors where compliance is a problem and the environmental benefits would be greatest. These efforts targeted at the auto industry, metal finishing sector, universities and public agencies achieved significant environmental improvements.

EPA-New England has long insisted that public agencies be held accountable to the same environmental standards as private parties. Last year we brought 13 new enforcement actions and settled seven actions against state, local and federal agencies. All told, we've taken more than 300 actions against public agencies since the mid-1990s.

We supplemented our enforcement with compliance assistance to ensure that these agencies fully understand their environmental responsibilities. One assistance program aimed at DPW facilities reached about 240 municipal officials at 12 training seminars in Vermont and New Hampshire. A follow-up survey found environmental compliance was up 48 percent and that 32 percent of the agencies reached had improved their operations.

Another sector we've targeted is the region's 262 universities and colleges. And, again, we've made strategic use of both enforcement and technical assistance to try to maximize compliance. Last March, for example, we simultaneously announced: a major enforcement action against the University of New Hampshire; the launching of an enforcement initiative against colleges and universities and the availability of compliance assistance. Prompted by the threat of enforcement and the offer of assistance, more than 350 representatives from universities attended EPA-sponsored compliance assistance workshops last year.

The auto sector also achieved greater compliance after EPA-New England's Assistance and Prevention Program completed 32 workshops, conducted 88 on-site visits and sent 45,350 mailings targeted at the auto industry.

All told, EPA-New England's "assistance and pollution prevention" program last year completed over 7,000 activities, including mailings, workshop and on-site assistance, that reached more than 390,000 individuals and organizations.

Enforcement efforts targeting geographic areas brought significant environmental gains to New England's most important resources. In 1995, EPA announced an initiative to make the Charles River safe for swimming and fishing by Earth Day 2005. Four years later, the Charles is cleaner than it has been in decades. The river met swimming standards 75 percent of the time in 1999, compared to 19 percent of the time in 1995. Enforcement actions over the past few years have significantly reduced sewage running into the Charles. EPA-New England has also worked in partnership with communities to reduce stormwater pollution and played a lead role in the formation of the Clean Charles 2005 Coalition, a new private-public partnership aimed at cleaning the river.

Programs that encourage companies to audit their operations, or establish programs to systematically prevent, detect and correct environmental violations, have also proved successful. Last year, the region received 16 such self-disclosures under its Audit Policy, the most it has received in any single year since the policy was finalized in 1995. If a company discovers violations through an audit and promptly corrects the violations and discloses them to EPA, EPA will waive punitive penalties that would otherwise be assessed for those violations. Of the 23 self-disclosures that have been fully processed since the policy was established, 87 percent have received a complete waiver of punitive penalties.

EPA-New England's Chemical Industry Audit Project has shown that voluntary compliance can be improved with the right ingredients: compliance assistance, marketing and follow-up inspections. About half of the companies in the sector attended a workshop and EPA received 10 letters voluntarily disclosing violations from eight firms that participated. The agency conducted about 40 inspections and anticipates an improved compliance rate in the sector.

"EPA has used a variety of tools to achieve substantive environmental results," Lubber said. "In the past few years, we have shown that there are a number of innovative ways to get cleaner air, water and land. We have learned that assistance, enforcement and incentives each play a key role in helping businesses and public agencies become more responsible to their communities. In the end, we have all benefitted from this integrated approach to environmental protection."

EPA-New England achieved great success last year in negotiating innovative environmental projects in settlements with violators. Environmental improvement projects worth $7.69 million were funded through enforcement settlements, an increase of $5.5 million over 1998. Among these projects, called Supplemental Environmental Projects:

• The City of Manchester, N.H. agreed to make environmental improvements worth $5.6 million within five years, including a $1 million urban ponds restoration initiative and a $2 million program to preserve valuable wildlife habitat. These improvements will be made in addition to the $52 million the city will spend to address combined sewer overflows which are polluting the Merrimack River.
• the United Technologies Corp. agreed to perform two environmental improvement projects worth more than $520,000 to settle a case alleging violations of four environmental laws at 19 plants throughout New England. The projects involve UTC performing a full-scale test of innovative technologies that could replace the most toxic form of chromium in its plating operations and working with the Nature Conservancy to restore and preserve a tidal marsh along the Connecticut River in Old Lyme, Conn. The agreement stems from independent environmental audits completed by UTC under the terms of an earlier enforcement settlement from 1993 and reflects major environmental strides made by the company in the 1990s.
• In settling a case concerning hazardous waste and spill prevention violations at a DPW yard, the City of Hartford agreed to pay $36,138 in penalties and invest at least $108,000 to clean nearly an acre of contaminated property downtown and prepare it for use as a recreation, garden and wildlife area.