State mulls Bella Vista fire contracts

Schedule to put out underground fire dependent on the weather

Contracts to expand efforts to extinguish an underground landfill fire in Bella Vista are in the early stages of review, according to the state Department of Environmental Quality.

The department’s confirmation Thursday comes three days after approval for the state to front up to $20 million for the work. The details of the financing haven’t been worked out, the governor’s office said Thursday. EnSafe is the Memphis, Tenn.-based company hired to help put out the fire.

Contract proposals for construction of an access road to the site and a small dam to retain water are being negotiated, said Donally Davis, communications director for the Department of Environmental Quality. Proposed construction contracts with state agencies require review by the Division of Building Authority at the state Department of Finance and Administration, she said.

Documents related to those contracts are turned in to the building authority for review, but the final contracts are still being negotiated by ADEQ , Finance Department spokesman Scott Hardin confirmed Thursday. Once the final contracts for the road and the weir are received, the final review “will take no more than one to two days,” Hardin said.

Site preparation started before the latest contracts were submitted, according to previous statements by the agency. That work includes clearing trees and other vegetation to create a staging area around the site and building a support system to facilitate fire control and fire response, the department said.

Assuming the division approves the contracts, the construction schedule will still depend on the weather, Davis said.

“Weather permitting, construction for the access road and dam is estimated to take

three to four weeks,” she said. “ADEQ is working to finalize a scope of work to extinguish the fire and excavate waste.”

Gov. Asa Hutchinson signed Act 345 on Monday afternoon, three working days after passage in the Legislature. The measure authorizes the state to tap reserve money to start work on extinguishing the blaze while the state continues to seek federal taxpayer dollars and other, permanent sources to pay for the work.

Firefighters discovered the underground fire at a stump dump on Trafalgar Road in Bella Vista on July 29. The dump is still burning.

Residents near the fire were urged in December to avoid prolonged or heavy exertion outdoors after an unhealthy air quality reading in the area. The state continues to caution people living within a half-mile radius of the blaze, although recent testing has shown air quality results in the “good” range.

Act 345 obligates ADEQ to pay the money back to the two reserve funds named in the bill. The two funds involved are the state’s Budget Stabilization Trust Fund and the state’s Hazardous Substance Remedial Action Trust Fund.

The cost to put out the fire and clean up the site could be between $21 million and $39 million, according to state estimates.

“The act is designed to be flexible,” said J.R. Davis, spokesman for the governor’s office. It allows either state reserve money to go to the project or federal taxpayer money if and when that becomes available. Any federal money that comes in after reserve money is spent can ultimately go to replenish state reserve money, he said.

“The idea is to make sure there are options so nothing slows down the process,” he said.

The financing arrangements will also accommodate repayment to the state if litigation to recoup the costs succeeds, the governor’s spokesman said. The state expects to recoup money spent putting out the fire from past owners and operators of the landfill, he said.

At least two lawsuits are already pending against prior owners and operators of the landfill, according to Benton County Circuit Court records. Cooper Communities, the Bella Vista Property Owners Association, Thomas Fredericks, Fredericks Construction and Blue Mountain Storage were added Thursday as defendants in a lawsuit concerning the underground fire.

The lawsuit, filed in November on behalf of Curtis and Tiffany Macomber and their sons, Ezra and Trevor, accuses Samuel Care Enterprise, doing business as Brown’s Tree Care, of negligence for causing the fire, failing to properly manage it and creating a nuisance because hazardous smoke emitted by the fire is coming onto their property.

Stacey and Bart Lewis, along with Normal and Mary Joan Lantz, were added as plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

The lawsuit states Fredericks acquired the property in 2003 and his construction company facilitated disposal of solid wastes at the facility. The lawsuit also accuses Cooper of disposing of solid waste at the site and the association of operating the stump dump for more than a decade.

“Once we officially receive the complaint filed against the property owners association, we will review the allegations,” said Kim Carlson, the association’s director of marketing. “We are unable to make further comments regarding ongoing litigation.”

That lawsuit is assigned to Benton County Circuit Judge Xollie Duncan.

Bella Vista resident Jim Parsons is also suing Cooper, the association, Fredericks, Blue Mountain and the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality.

The total forwarded from the state’s reserve cannot exceed $20 million, and the money is to be repaid no later than June 20, 2023, according to Act 345.

The budget stabilization fund was created in 2015 at Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s request to create a fund that can make loans to state departments as needed. The remedial fund is a similar reserve set up specifically for ADEQ for emergencies involving pollutants.

The finances in the bill are structured as a loan because of how the funds are set up and to allow work to begin this fiscal year, according to both a spokesman for the governor’s office and the bill’s chief sponsor, Sen. Jim Hendren, R-Gravette.

In Bella Vista, officials with ADEQ and EnSafe are monitoring the situation. The National Guard and state Health Department are also keeping track of air quality in the area. No serious problems with air quality in residential areas near the landfill were reported Thursday, a health department spokesman said.

Tom Judson, the Property Owners Association’s chief operating officer, said the association operated the dump for wood and yard waste on leased land from December 2003 to 2016, after which the site was covered with soil.