EVERETT – It’s beginning to seem like the dirt will never leave.
After nearly 10 years of back and forth, with the end reportedly just over a month away, cleanup at the old Asarco site has stalled indefinitely because the company has declared bankruptcy.
On Wednesday, Asarco, the Arizona-based copper mining giant, filed for Chapter 11 reorganization in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Corpus Christi, Texas.
The bankruptcy was brought on in part by 1,500 of its miners and other workers, who have been on strike since early July.
Add that to the company’s more than $1 billion in liabilities, including those associated with environmental cleanup costs and about 95,000 pending asbestos-related personal injury claims.
The company could not be reached for comment Thursday.
Asarco was optimistic Wednesday morning that the cleanup could go on, but by the end of the day, work had stopped indefinitely, said Darcy Walker, smelter site manager for the Everett Housing Authority.
Discouraging news, especially so close to the end of the cleanup, Walker said.
“It’s not a good feeling,” he said. “There’s a lot of uncertainty. I’m hopeful in the coming days and weeks we’ll be able to have a clearer understanding of how to proceed.”
In 2004, the Everett Housing Authority paid $3.4 million for the heavily contaminated 18-acre site off E. Marine View Drive where a smelter sat until 1915.
Last week, the housing authority agreed to sell 7 acres in the heart of the former Asarco smelter site to developer Barclays North Inc. for $3.2 million.
The Lake Stevens developer has plans to build up to 85 single-family townhouses there.
However, the deal cannot close until the Department of Ecology certifies the land as clean.
There’s also an expiration date on the close of the sale – Jan. 1, 2006 – but it could be extended because of the unexpected holdup, Walker said.
Neighbors had mixed reactions to the news.
“Well, there you go. Now what do we do?” said Dolores De Monbrun, chairwoman of the Delta Neighborhood Association.
The Asarco site is in her neighborhood.
“It’s at the actual gateway to the town as well as the neighborhood, so it’s a real eyesore,” De Monbrun said. “I’m sure everybody’s really tired of it.”
George Deane, who lives on Hawthorne Street next to the contaminated site, said the longer it takes to clean up, the longer his view will remain unfettered by development.
He’s perturbed that there were 22 residences removed from the former smelter site, but that about 85 homes may be going in.
“We had a nice neighborhood with individual homes and families and cats and dogs and grandparents visiting,” he said.
Rick Klepadlo, an Arizona resident who visits his son John in Everett for several months each summer, said the dirt in his son’s Hawthorne Avenue yard was supposed to be replaced last year.
“Now with this mess here, it’s not going to get done this year unless something happens rather quickly,” he said.
The company has until 2007 to clean up John Klepadlo’s yard, along with almost two dozen others.
Instead of paying Asarco directly for the property, the housing authority has paid contractors to dig up and remove the arsenic-laced soil. Asarco is charged with paying any cost overruns.
The contaminated dirt has been shipped, by barge and now by dump trucks, to Pierce County, where it is placed in toxic waste containers or used as fill for a redevelopment project that will include a high-tech cap to prevent contamination.
Though the cleanup was about a month and a half from being done, Walker said, he has no idea what the remaining costs are on the project.
“Until that last scoop of dirt goes off site, we really don’t know what the total cost will be,” he said.
In the weeks to come, Walker and others will try to figure out Everett’s place in the ordeal.
“What bankruptcy and reorganization means for Asarco and how that affects us down the road, we’re just not certain at this time,” Walker said. “I certainly don’t know when we’re going to start back up at this point, but obviously we’d like to start up sooner rather than later.”
Reporter Jennifer Warnick: 425-339-3429 or jwarnick@ heraldnet.com.
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