Later this month, DEQ and Pacific plan to sign a Prospective Purchaser Agreement defining the cleanup that Pacific will perform on the site in exchange for DEQ limiting its future liability to the State of Oregon for cleanup costs at the site. The12-acre portion Pacific is eyeing has been home to a tannery and a battery plant. Chromium, lead and cyanide have been detected on the property and in the groundwater.
Information on when and how the actual sale of the 12-acre site would take place was not available, as Pacific's managing partner Patrick Lucas was not immediately available for comment. The company has an option to purchase the site from Trans-Pacific International, an option no doubt contingent on limiting said liability.
Once the agreement with DEQ is done, Rod Struck of DEQ's Voluntary Cleanup Program says Pacific will begin soil cleanup activities and complete the cleanup required by the agreement within three years. Any cleanup required at the facility outside the scope of the agreement will be performed by previous owners or operators, or by DEQ. The agreement includes a restriction against future groundwater use or residential development on the property.
Comments on the effort are being accepted until Feb. 15 and can be sent to Rod Struck, DEQ Northwest Region, 2020 S.W. Fourth Ave., Suite 400, Portland, OR 97201. Struck also can be reached by e-mail at [email protected]. DEQ will hold a meeting to receive comments if requested by 10 or more persons or by a group with a membership of 10 or more. To view the so-called Frontier Leather file, call DEQ at 503-229-6729.
The remaining 21 acres of the 33-acre site, which is also contaminated, is owned by Portland-based trust Link Enterprises. Struck says his understanding is that the trust cannot afford to clean up the site and so the state is in the process of having it declared an "orphan site," which will allow it to dip into the "orphan fund" to investigate and clean the site. Once that's done, Struck says the state would be place a lien against the property for its costs.
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