Recycler Fined For Polluting

A federal judge has ordered a Gaston, SC, recycling company to pay $2.34 million in fines for polluting a Lexington County waterway.

In a decision praised by environmentalists as a victory for citizen enforcement, Judge Matthew Perry has ruled that Gaston Copper Recycling Corp. must pay the money for discharging hazardous substances such as mercury, lead, copper and cadmium into Boggy Branch, a tributary of Bull Swamp Creek. The creek flows into the north fork of the Edisto River.

The decision last week came after more than a decade of litigation and the death of one key participant. The plant, which closed in 1995, had been controversial for nearly two decades because of environmental issues.

A company official, John Stephens, said Gaston Copper's lawyers would ask Perry to reconsider his ruling before deciding whether to appeal it. Stephens said the company believes there were "extenuating circumstances" that led to some of the discharges.

Stephens also said Gaston Copper believes it was unfairly penalized for not fulfilling certain duties.

"I don't think that he considered all of the issues," Stephens said.

Whether the fines will be paid is questionable, according to people on both sides of the lawsuit. The company, based in Carrollton, Ga., ceased all but a bare-bones operation at the site in 1995.

"Gaston Copper is basically broke," Stephens said.

The fines stem from a September 1992 lawsuit filed by two environmental groups, Friends of the Earth Inc. and Citizens Local Environmental Action Network Inc.

The suit was filed under a provision of the Clean Water Act that allows a citizen to sue polluters if they exceed federal discharge limits and no regulatory agency takes action.

Bob Guild, a Columbia environmental lawyer, said the lawsuit was brought because state regulators working for the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control "effectively failed" to require the company to meet its discharge limits or its monitoring and reporting requirements.

"If left to the regulators, the law's not going to be enforced," Guild said.

Such lawsuits are rare because they require enormous resources, Guild said. But he said Perry's ruling "proves to polluters that citizens can demand enforcement of environmental laws to protect people, rivers and streams."

DHEC spokesman Thom Berry declined to comment on whether the agency had failed to enforce discharge restrictions established in permits issued to the company. The first permit was issued in 1984 to AT&T Nassau Metals Corp., which sold the plant to Gaston Copper in 1990.

Perry initially ruled in 1998 that environmentalists who filed the lawsuit could not prove they were affected by the pollution. An appeals court reversed that decision because it said Wilson O. Shealy of Swansea, who owned a lake four miles downstream from the discharge site, testified he used his lake less because of the pollution.

Shealy, former chairman of the Lexington County Republican Party, died last year. But Pete Oliver, a local activist once employed at the site under a previous owner, said the ruling vindicated Shealy's position in the case.

"Wilson O. Shealy is probably very happy when he hears this up in heaven," Oliver said.

In last week's ruling, Perry found that between 1991 and 1997, Gaston Copper exceeded discharge limits authorized by its DHEC permits for 91 days, violated monitoring requirements 396 times, and did not comply with reporting requirements 323 times. The company also failed to upgrade its wastewater treatment plant for 54 days, he said.

Under federal law, companies that violate provisions of their permits "shall be subject to a civil penalty not to exceed $25,000 per day for each violation," but allows some discretion based on other factors, including whether the company benefited economically.

Perry rejected the plaintiffs' request to add $836,000 in penalties to Gaston Copper. "It appears to the court that the defendant has made a good faith effort to comply with the requirements of its permit," he said. The Columbia (South Carolina) State