LEWIS RUN -ðThe state Department of Environmental Protection has
finalized an agreement with McCourt Label Cabinet Co. to resolve
its liability of a contaminated site in Lewis Run Borough.

In January, the DEP announced they had reached a tentative
agreement with McCourt Label to pay more than $100,000 for its part
in the contamination of an adjacent water well in the borough. In
March, the DEP completed a question and answer period regarding the
agreement, and now it is final.

The agreement went into effect Sept. 13.

The company is charged with paying more than $100,000 over a
20-year period, plus two percent of the company’s net profit
between the years 2014 and 2033 to resolve its liability of the
site.

As reported in June of 2005, the agreement also said McCourt
Label would have to implement an environmental management system at
the Lewis Run facility.

According to Freda Tarbell, DEP community relations coordinator,
implementing an environmental management system would include
raising the consciousness of employees throughout the company about
environmental performance.

“The company has to establish a system for managing things they
do that interact with the environment,” said Tarbell. “They have to
make sure their employees know that it is a part of all of their
jobs, not just the responsibility of one individual.

“The goal is to make sure everyone is mindful of their
activities and of the potential (affects) they have on the
environment,” added Tarbell.

The water well and its contamination, or potential for
contamination, was discovered when, through realty transactions,
the DEP became aware of the possibility of a future problem.

The well in question was used by the borough as a supplemental
well during the very dry summer months as needed. They had drilled
it in the mid-1990s for use. While they were using it a few years
later, the potential for contamination was discovered.

Tarbell said in March the DEP asked the borough to take the well
out of operation because of that contamination potential. She said
use of the well could cause contamination as the chemicals would be
drawn up through the ground.

The ground water had been contaminated by volatile organic
compounds (VOCs) which are a class of chemicals that have high
vapor pressure and low water solubility. Many VOCs, according to a
United States Geological Survey Web site, are man-made chemicals
that are used and produced in the manufacture of paints,
pharmaceuticals and refrigerants.

After the DEP asked the borough to discontinue use of the
contaminated well, they searched for a suitable area to drill a new
well and drilled it for the borough using funds from the state
funded Hazardous Sites Cleanup Program.

That well is not ready for use at this time. The borough and DEP
are currently working to find a way to get the “new” well hooked up
for use. The borough doesn’t want to use the “new” well because,
according to their engineer’s (E&M Engineers and Surveyors PC)
findings, it will not pump water at the same level as the existing
well they had been using. In addition to that, they want the DEP to
prove that the “old” well is still contaminated before they make
the decision to not use it again.

Tarbell has said in the past that even if the well doesn’t test
positive for contaminates at a particular time, the potential
remains with use because a plume, or flow of contaminated ground
water moves past or toward that well.

Another concern of Lewis Run officials is recovering some of the
costs of hooking up the “new” well to water lines through the
borough, which could be recovered in one of two ways, according to
Tarbell.

The first would be for the borough to do the work themselves and
to then seek reimbursement through the Hazardous Sites Cleanup
Program. The second is to pursue the “responsible parties” for the
contamination.

The borough continues to attempt to set up a meeting with DEP
officials to talk about its concerns while the DEP looks over some
of the questions developed by borough engineers.

As for the “responsible parties,” the DEP has not given up on
working to find out who else may be involved and to develop some
type of agreement with those companies.

Control Chief had also been named as a responsible party in
January, but an agreement with DEP has not been reached.

At this time, said Tarbell, there have been no other responsible
persons named in the matter, but she added that it “still could
happen in the future.”