Salvage Yard Issues at Forefront Of MPCA Meeting

Neighborhood residents would just as soon see him run out of town, and even John Schwartzman, owner of the embattled Schwartzman Company salvage yard, acknowledges that he’s worn out his welcome (Read earlier story).

“Up until two years ago, we thought we were good citizens,” he told as many as 75 residents at a hearing Nov. 20 sponsored by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to gather citizen input and to update the public on the agency’s efforts to enforce a January 2003 administrative order in Anoka County District Court against the salvage yard, located in Anoka, Minn.

“People are impatient, I understand,” said Schwartzman, whose metal shredder installed in May 1999 and the shredder residue it has generated has touched off a series of citizen complaints, criminal search warrants, criminal proceedings successfully defended by the company, and civil court actions dating all the back to 2000.

“People don’t like me. They want to bury me,” Schwartzman said while defending his operation and others like it. “I’m going to do anything I can to save my business,” he said.

The salvage yard was the site of a large fire Sept. 9, 2002 that spewed billowing soot and smoke into the air, that could be seen from as away as downtown Minneapolis and that reportedly threatened residents’ personal safety.

But even before the big blaze, the Schwartzman Company started receiving numerous neighborhood complaints about dust and noise pollution after the operation installed the shredder, which is supposed to extract scrap metals from appliances and automobiles and leave a benign substance called shredder fluff.

It is that shredder fluff, constituting a berm against the noise and dust pollution, and a large stockpile of 40,000 cubic yards that has since been reduced to 33 percent to 50 percent of its original size, according to Jeff Connell, MPA compliance coordinator, that the Minnesota Court of Appeals affirmed Oct. 28 was indeed solid and/or hazardous waste.

“The stockpile is probably down to one-half to one-third of what it was, but today as we know it, there has been no progress on the berm,” Connell said.

The MPCA and the Schwartzman Company are scheduled to be back in Anoka County District Court Dec. 2 for a hearing to either enforce or extend a strict timeline for removal of the shredder fluff berm, which has tested above allowable levels of 50 parts per million for polychlorinated biphenyls and also lead for the fluff not to be considered hazardous waste.

The MPCA, as part of its administrative order, has also sought an injunction against the operation of the metal shredder, at least until the company has complied with all the stipulations set forth in its January 2003 administrative order.

“At this point, all we’re seeking is the removal of the shredder,” Connell said.

The specific source of lead at the salvage yard, according to the MPCA, has not been identified. But it can be found naturally and from human activities, including burning of fossil fuels, mining and manufacturing. Another possible source is lead acid batteries.

Schwartzman and two attorneys representing him appealed to the public and the neighborhood to give him more time to remove the shredder fluff berm and to comply with other stipulations spelled out in the January 2003 MPCA administrative order.

Fighting off criminal charges while both negotiating with the MPCA and attempting to find a place to dispose of the shredder fluff have delayed the Schwartzman Company from complying sooner than it otherwise could have and still can, both monetarily and in an effective way, according to Schwartzman.

“We know we’ve outgrown our welcome with the shedder,” Schwartzman said.

Schwartzman is currently looking for alternative sites away from residential neighborhoods to which he can move the shredder, but that it has not been easy, he said.

“We’re not trying to cause people any problems,” Schwartzman said. He’s won several recycling awards from Anoka County, and Schwartzman contended that his business is a legitimate one that serves a public purpose. Anoka County (Minnesota) Union