Property owner already missed first pollution payment

A legal agreement to help pay the costs of groundwater contamination from a fuel oil business may already be on shaky ground.

Virginia Cain, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection confirmed Thursday that the owner of the property where the pollution originated has failed to make the first payment required under the agreement.

Under the agreement reached in August, called a “consent decree,” Ethan Good, the principal in several trusts involved with the ownership of the former Good Oil Co. site off Route 663, was supposed to begin making monthly $7,000 payments to the DEP.

These payments were to cover the costs of the $2.3 million the state spent running public water lines to the dozens of homes whose wells were contaminated by the chemicals leaching off the Good’s Oil site.

However, perhaps because the consent decree has not been finalized yet, Good has made no payment yet, Cain confirmed, although the DEP considers it past due.

Although it was signed in August, the consent decree does not officially go into effect until a public comment period ends on Dec. 7.

Asked what happens if no payment is made by then, Cain replied in an email “if Mr. Good and his related companies fail to comply, the (DEP) could petition to enforce the agreement in a second legal proceeding before the Commonwealth Court.”

“Alternatively,” Cain added, “the (DEP) could also demand that Mr. Good list the site with a licensed realtor and sell it “as is” for fair market value. The Department would receive the money from the proceeds of the sale.”

Cain also wrote that “the agreement does not have a termination clause. However, the agreement will terminate when Mr. Good has paid off the liability of $2,275,000, or after the (DEP) has received proceeds from the sale of the site.”

The agreement itself also notes that if the “Good parties fail to comply in a timely manner with any term or provision of this consent decree they shall be in violation” and, as a result, are liable for civil penalties of $100 per day, per violation, which shall be cumulative.

Because the groundwater pollution is also a factor in a zoning hearing case now being heard regarding a requested expansion of the proposed Gibraltar Rock Quarry, the ultimate legal standing of the Good’s Oil site is of interest to both New Hanover Township and Gibraltar Rock.

During the most recent zoning hearing, an expert hired by the township testified that the pollution control measures Gibraltar have proposed are inadequate to handle the chemicals that will leach into the quarry pits.

Toby Kessler, a hydrogeology expert who works for Gilmore and Associates, also testified that he believes quarry operations could spread the contamination, and speed the movement of the contamination through the aquifer.

Kessler and the township’s special counsel in the matter, Robert Brant, are reviewing the consent decree and have not yet offered a response to the New Hanover Township supervisors.