City demands stringent perchlorate cleanup order

The city has joined its neighbor to the north and the Santa
Clara Valley Water District in demanding a speedy and more
stringent cleanup of a 10-mile groundwater perchlorate plume
running below the Llagas Creek subbasin.
MORGAN HILL

The city has joined its neighbor to the north and the Santa Clara Valley Water District in demanding a speedy and more stringent cleanup of a 10-mile groundwater perchlorate plume running below the Llagas Creek subbasin.

The government bodies are spearheading a community effort to push for an aggressive and complete cleanup of the pollution in time for the Dec. 7 meeting of the California Regional Water Quality Control Board in San Luis Obispo.

The regional water agency’s eight-member board of directors will decide whether to approve its so-called Cleanup and Abatement Order, commonly referred to as the “CAO.” The two cities submitted their responses to the order earlier this month, following the same action by the Perchlorate Community Advisory Group outlined at a meeting at the San Martin Lions Club Oct. 29.

The message to the board and Olin Corp., a Tennessee-based company that manufactured road flares and is responsible for the pollution, is clear: clean up the chemical and do it soon.

The draft CAO “fails to meet the needs and expectations of our regional community,” Gilroy administrator Jay Baksa wrote in a Nov. 2 letter to the board’s executive officer Roger Briggs. The city’s concerns are “with the lack of any requirement in the CAO for active remediation and cleanup of the aquifer outside of the core plume area,” Baksa added, later writing that Gilroy seeks “a comprehensive, time-certain, basin-wide cleanup plan.”

In a 27-page letter that represents where Morgan Hill stands on the matter, attorney Steven L. Hoch of the Los Angeles-based law firm Hatch & Parent wrote that the order is “frankly, too little and too late” and “contains many ambiguities rendering the document impotent as an enforcement tool.” 

In its comments, the water district also found fault with the draft, particularly the missive directing Olin to cleanup the heaviest polluted area – called Priority Zone A – and only monitor the rest of the area.

The district prefers “active remediation in a wider area,” according to the Nov. 1 letter. The draft also doesn’t make clear the “schedule and scope” of the cleanup plan and is missing interim remediation requirements, which “can be accomplished without waiting for completion of all the access agreements, encroachment permits and other requirements,” the letter states.

Olin’s registered its response in a Nov. 1 letter to the board, in which David M. Share, director of environmental remediation, disagreed with the order with regards to Olin’s responsibility for the Northeast Area, contending that Olin isn’t responsible for all of the perchlorate contamination. Further, Olin isn’t able to clean the area to background – or undetectable levels – rather than the interim cleanup goal. Technical comments to support Olin’s position were prepared by its consultant Mactec Engineering and Consulting Inc. 

In reaction to the comments and in preparation for the Dec. 7 meeting, the board staff will make changes it deems “necessary and appropriate” to make the final draft of the CAO “a bit more specific,” said Hector Hernandez, a water resources control engineer with the board. 

“Ultimately the board will decide whether the CAO should be issued,” he said.