Healthy Communities News

PHILADELPHIA—On the eve of Superfund’s 25th anniversary, a new report released today by PennEnvironment finds Superfund’s ability to respond to toxic cleanups in Pennsylvania and nationwide jeopardized by persistent funding shortfalls.

The Superfund program is the nation’s cornerstone law for cleaning up the worst-of-the-worst dump sites in America, and holding the responsible polluters accountable for funding these remediation projects.

Pennsylvania is currently home to the second highest number of Superfund sites in the nation with 94 such sites, only behind New Jersey which has 113 such sites. California has the third highest number of Superfund sites with 93.

Yet the 25th anniversary of Superfund is being met by many in the environmental and public health community with apprehension and concern instead of optimism.

“Superfund was designed to protect the public from toxic threats, but funding shortfalls are crippling the program,” said David Masur, PennEnvironment Director. “Without more funding, Superfund approaches toxic cleanups in Pennsylvania and across the nation with empty pockets.”

Since 2002, Superfund has endured annual funding deficits, with overall deficits exceeding $600 million (see chart below). If current program funding levels remain static, funding shortfalls can be expected to increase, slowing down or postponing existing toxic cleanups. Moreover, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, this shortfall threatens Superfund’s natural disaster response functions and only tightens the program's purse strings further.

Many states like Pennsylvania are already feeling the effects of an under-funded Superfund program. A number of sites in Pennsylvania didn’t receive new funding in 2004 or will not receive new funding in 2005 due to the program’s tight financial times, including the Crossely Farm site in Berks County, the Franklin Slag Pile in Philadelphia, the Havertown PCP site in Delaware County, and the North Penn Area 7 site in Montgomery County (see list below).

This trend of clean-up slowdowns under Superfund can be seen nationwide, preventing the clean-up of 41 sites in 2002 and 2003 while limiting another 67 sites to partial funding. The number of cleanups has also dropped from 77 per year to 40 per year across the country.

PennEnvironment’s report also describes how cleanups after natural disasters can pose a significant and unexpected financial drain on a program already suffering from a scarcity of funds. This added financial strain compounds existing funding problems and jeopardizes Superfund’s ability to respond to natural disasters and to clean up toxic waste sites. Yet funding from the Superfund program has been essential for cleaning up natural disasters, like the aftermath of Hurricane Floyd in southeastern Pennsylvania in 1999 (see list of natural disaster clean up funded by Superfund below.).

“At a time when we should be celebrating Superfund’s silver anniversary, we are instead eulogizing a dying program,” said Masur. “Unless funding levels increase, future cleanup costs and potentially massive Katrina costs will continue Superfund’s fiscal freefall.”

The report concludes that Superfund must receive more funding to meet current spending needs in order to protect public health. By reinstating Superfund’s traditional source of income provided by the polluter fees, the program will receive sufficient funding to clean up toxic waste sites and to support disaster response functions.

PennEnvironment is a statewide citizen-based environmental advocacy organization working to promote clean air, clean water and protect Pennsylvania’s open spaces. For a full copy of this report or information about other PennEnvironment programs, please visit our website at www.PennEnvironment.org.