Studer Community Institute

The tangle of pit regulation

November 21, 2014
/ Shannon Nickinson
/ government

As Escambia County embarked on an effort to tighten up regulation of borrow pits, landfills and construction and demolition debris pits, a couple of names rose to the public spotlight. Rolling Hills C&D pit and its neighbor Longleaf C&D were the two facilities that garnered the most attention as residents galvanized complaints about them. Both are near homes, community centers and schools. But they aren’t the only pits in the county. When county staff first did an inventory of the number of landfills and pits in the county, they found 105 with permits on record, though many were closed, reclaimed, no longer in use or were one location with multiple sites permitted on the land. The list now is 51 operations in the county. [sidebar] LIST OF 51 FACILITIES INCLUDES: BCC on-hold: 1 Reclaimed lakes / retention ponds: 3 FDEP closed: 2 Court settlement: 1 Private operations didn’t submit: 8 Private operation submitted: 20 County operations submitted: 16 GRAND TOTAL: 51 Eight private facilities didn’t reapply; six are owned by APAC, a paving company, one by Charles Brown and by NIT management, County Administrator Jack Brown. APCA says their pits have not been utilized for years, “but my position, and I think the board’s position is going to be, is that we’re going to require you even if it is closed, you need some kind of permit that says it is a closed facility,” says County Administrator Jack Brown. “We will still inspect annually and if you open it back up, you have to go through permitting all over again.” [/sidebar] As of Nov. 7, 20 privately owned facilities and 16 county-run pits have submitted applications to be considered after the moratorium is lifted. “It’s a lot of pits,” Brown says. “I have to say I was surprised at that number, especially the number of them close to residential neighborhoods. As the county continues to grow and expand, it could become an even bigger issue.” When Brown and county staff began reviewing the issue, some of the findings were not pleasant: —THERE WAS NO TO-DO LIST: The county tried to address the issue in 2005, and again in 2011, but Brown says “there never was put in place a systemic means to deal with the issues.” No master calendar for inspections. No master list of areas where complaints were frequent. “I think the initial work was done and it was not followed up on,” Brown said. “I think a lot of it had to do with changes in administrations and administrators.” —PERMITTING ITSELF WAS CONFUSING: In June, for example, when the owner of Longleaf C&D pit wanted a county solid waste permit to bring the facility back into operation, county staff recommended it be approved even though it was operating under a groundwater remediation plan under orders of the Florida DEP. [sidebar] WHO’S ON FIRST INDEED When it comes to putting a finger on who is responsible for each aspect of regulating these facilities, it can sometimes feel like the classic Abbott & Costello routine. HOW DENSE IS THE ISSUE? Consider: — Groundwater contamination is not illegal, until it moves. According to DEP, there can be contamination from a facility in the groundwater as long as that contamination is confined to the pit’s property line. Only if a plume develops and goes over the property line does DEP require a remediation plan to be in place. Mostly that means the owners will have to pay to install monitoring wells to try to keep tabs on where the contaminated groundwater is moving. As long as you have a remediation action plan on file with DEP and can show you are working on it, you meet DEP’s requirements. — Smells are a nuisance, until they aren’t. Hydrogen sulfide smells like rotten eggs. It can irritate the eyes, nose and throat. The effects are worse for people who already having breathing problems. The longer you are exposed to it, you lose the ability to smell it until it gets to higher concentrations. So over time, you won’t notice the smell until it is at high concentrations. When it’s at higher concentrations, the irritation is worse. DEP only does groundwater monitoring; hydrogen sulfide exposure is viewed as a “nuisance odor.” Health alerts for hydrogen sulfide are under the Department of Health’s umbrella. Earlier this year the Escambia County Health Department issued a health alert for Wedgewood due to elevated levels of hydrogen sulfide in the air. The alert forced the relocation of some summer youth programs at Wedgewood Community Center. [/sidebar] The county permit process did not require a mention of facility’s status with the state. “That non-inclusion is what ends up six months from now coming out that they are under a 36-month groundwater remediation order and we haven’t the faintest idea as the board that voted on the operation (of the pit) there,” said Commissioner Steven Barry at that meeting. “The public doesn’t believe that we don’t know that.” So how do you permit a borrow pit? First you go to the state’s soil database to see if you have the proper soil in your area to do a borrow pit. Then you go to developmental services and fill out an application. There is $2,000 application fee. You check the zoning for the location you want to see if it is permitted use. But, Brown says, a lot of these pits predate even the rules that are already in place. Then you have to get a state permit, though what kind of permit from DEP you will need depends on the size of the facility, if you plan to move the material around on site or off site, and other things. There also may be solid waste or environmental services department review that might be required depending on what will go on there. Code enforcement inspects the facilities, but there was no system in place to ensure that active pits were being inspected on a given schedule. That seems like a lot of cooks in the kitchen. “It certainly is,” Brown says. There is now a written inventory of the pits and a notation of whether they are active, and the status of heir permits. Among the proposed changes Brown hopes to recommend: — Making developmental services the department ultimately responsible for county permitting to “tighten up who is ultimately responsible,” Brown says. County permitting is renewed annually. DEP permits are good for five years at a time. — Checking the DEP database when a pit’s county permits come up for renewal, which Brown says is critical.

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The tangle of pit regulation

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