EVERETT – To some drivers, the ruckus Tuesday morning on the hillside above E. Marine View Drive near Broadway was nothing more than a jackhammer breaking apart concrete.
It was far more meaningful to George Deane.
After 14 years of lawsuits, studies and meetings, the noise meant that Asarco Inc. was finally about to start digging up arsenic-laced dirt that had left much of his neighborhood like a surreal ghost town.
“I’m certainly glad to see it,” Deane said as he looked from his back deck at the foundations of some of the 22 homes that Asarco tore down in the late 1990s because of contamination fears. “I want to see our community back, with families and kids and pets and gardens, and grandparents visiting.”
Workers from a contractor hired by Asarco Tuesday broke apart one foundation. In the next several days, they will level the land and start piling up some of the contaminated dirt there. Heavy plastic sheeting will cover the dirt, which will eventually be removed.
Like Deane, Marian Krell felt relieved to see cleanup work begin on the site. Her involvement with the Asarco issue began first as a member of the Council of Neighborhoods in 1990, then as head of the Office of Neighborhoods and now as a city councilwoman.
“I was young when I started with this,” she said with a laugh.
Phoenix-based Asarco is still negotiating with the state, the federal government and the Everett Housing Authority on a proposed deal that would lead to construction of up to 85 homes, townhouses and duplexes on land that used to house an Asarco smelter. The housing agency would pay Asarco more than $3.4 million for the land containing the 22 foundations, and for 15 nearby homes. Asarco would ship the contaminated dirt to a toxic-waste dump in Pierce County.
Darcy Walker, Asarco site project manager for the housing authority, said he hoped a final deal can be reached within the next few weeks.
Asarco is still collecting rent from tenants in seven of the 15 homes it owns. Last month, Asarco notified them they had to move to make way for the redevelopment.
Charito Santonil, 40, was thumbing through The Herald’s for-rent classifieds as she listened to the jackhammer Tuesday. Santonil and Jay Boiselle, 36, are wondering where they’re going to find a house in or near Everett with enough land for their five dogs at anywhere near the bargain $550 a month rent they paid Asarco. A pile of furniture and boxes was in their front yard waiting to be picked up by a charity.
On Hawthorn Street, Joshua Melum, 24, hasn’t even started looking for an apartment, much less begun packing.
“I knew it was a possibility that I’d have to move out, but I was hoping it wouldn’t happen,” he said. “I don’t really like it, but I don’t have a choice.”
Reporter David Olson: 425-339-3452 or dolson@heraldnet.com
Dan Bates / The Herald
A cleanup worker hoses down a backhoe equipped with a hammer. The backhoe broke up concrete foundations Tuesday at the Asarco cleanup site in Everett.
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