In the wake of an asbestos controversy at the demolished Levittown Shopping Center,
the state Department of Environmental Protection plans to inspect the
50-acre Tullytown site next week, a department spokeswoman said
Thursday.
DEP
officials will "look for signs of asbestos-containing materials at the
site," according to Lynda Rebarchak, a DEP spokeswoman.
No air, soil or water tests are planned, but they could take place
if DEP officials find signs of the cancer-causing material at the site at the corner of the Levittown Parkway and Route 13.
"Based on what they see, we’ll determine if anything further is needed," Rebarchak said.
The
inspection came at the request of state Rep. John T. Galloway, D-140,
who recently discovered the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had
fined the site’s developer, owner and a demolition subcontractor
$37,400 for mishandling asbestos-containing materials during the
Levittown Shopping Center’s demolition in 2002.
The
violation and the fine had not been previously reported to borough,
county or state officials and nearby residents and officials at a
school across the street were never told of the apparent health risk.
Galloway
said he wasn’t sure if the DEP’s inspection would go far enough, since
much of the site is covered in piles of rubble, but he said
environmental officials need to determine if a health risk remains at
the site.
"The very first concern I have is the health of the people of my district," Galloway said. "The first thing I want to find out is if that site is safe. I want an assurance that the site is safe."
While researching state grants and low-interest loans for the long-delayed shopping center last month, Galloway
said he found court documents detailing the EPA fine for the asbestos
violation, a fine the site’s developer, Stephen Ifshin of DLC
Management Corp., never mentioned.
In
a brief phone interview Thursday, Ifshin called the controversy a
"non-issue," which he said was manufactured by Galloway and the Courier
Times to "create hysterics."
"All
I care about is developing the shopping center for Tullytown and you’ve
made a whole story out of nothing," Ifshin said. "Write whatever you
want, I don’t really care, because you guys will look like fools in a
month. You have it all wrong."
When asked why he never reported the asbestos violation to borough officials, Ifshin said it was "none of your business."
The
lack of public notice over the asbestos violation has drawn outrage
from Congressman Patrick Murphy, D-8, as well as several state, county
and borough officials.
On
Thursday, Bucks County Commissioner Sandra Miller said the fact that
county officials were never notified of the asbestos violation was
"very disturbing."
"There
just aren’t words strong enough to express my sense of outrage," Miller
said. "We have constituents that were placed in harm’s way."
According
to EPA spokeswoman Donna Heron, EPA officials followed proper
guidelines in response to the violation. She said there’s no legal
requirement to report an asbestos-related violation to local, state or
county authorities.
Rebarchak
said Thursday an EPA official did call or e-mail a DEP official in 2005
regarding the violation, but no follow-up was done by the state agency
since the EPA was handling the investigation.
David
Masur, director of PennEnvironment, a statewide environmental advocacy
group, said the public should have been informed about the violation
even though there’s no law requiring the EPA to do so.
"This
is where the letter of the law as a defense is pretty illegitimate,"
Masur said. "For the EPA to fall back on ‘Well, we didn’t break the
law,’ doesn’t mean it was the ethical decision to make."
Bucks County
Commissioner James Cawley said the fact that the county, or at least
borough, officials were never informed of the violation "defies
understanding."
"There
are legal obligations and then there are moral obligations," Cawley
said. "It is unconscionable what took place and we’ve got to make sure
it does not happen again."
Miller said it was time to change the procedures that kept the public in the dark about the violation.
"At the very least I think the county should have been notified," Miller said. "That has to be corrected."
Asbestos
is made up of microscopic bundles of fibers that, when released into
the air, can be inhaled into the lungs and cause health problems such
as asbestosis, mesothelioma and lung cancer, according to the EPA.
In
April and May 2002, a federal inspector at the demolition of the
Levittown Shopping Center saw asbestos-containing material "strewn on
the ground throughout the shopping center, piled in open Dumpsters, and
left hanging from building ceilings and walls," according to court
documents.
In
November 2004, the EPA fined the site’s owner, developer and a
demolition subcontractor $37,400 for the violation. According to a
statement from DLC Management Corp. the developer paid $13,090 of the
fine to the EPA "without admitting any liability."
The demolition subcontractor, Four Strong Builders Inc. of Clifton, N.J., paid the remaining $24.310 in August 2006, according to a statement sent Thursday by the Four Strong company.
Galloway represents residents in Bristol, Morrisville, Tullytown, Falls, two districts in Bristol Township and one district in Middletown. Murphy represents the residents of Bucks County, some districts of Abington, Upper Dublin and Upper Moreland in Montgomery County and two wards in Philadelphia.
