Source: http://www.berkshireeagle.com, April 13, 2015
By: Phil Demers
Workers operating backhoes have begun carefully dismantling a polluted former dry cleaning business site — an eyesore located behind City Hall — beginning what promises to be a costly, multi-year environmental remediation project.
The 83-year-old structure at 35-41 Federal St., which housed Stetson Dry Cleaners, is expected to come down fully by July. The work, performed by Jay-Mor Enterprises out of Pelham, N.H., will cost the city roughly $250,000 in Community Development Block Grant funds.
Stetson closed its doors for good in 2006, and the structure’s current owner, Narinder Sandhu, stopped paying taxes in 2007 — owing close to $100,000.
Left behind was a significant safety problem, as the building is host to a chemical “plume” and has been subject to vandalism and looting, even rumored squatting, according to the city Community Development Office. The building’s windows have remained open for years to prevent the buildup of noxious fumes from the contamination.
“I really, really believe that if it were on North Street, it’d be gone by now,” said Pasquale Arace, owner of the nearby Highland Restaurant.
The laundry list of chemicals, most notably tetrachloroethylene (PCE), that contaminate the immediate area extends out in a radius of unknown size. Arace said he felt “lucky” that a state Department of Environmental Protection test showed no chemicals present in the air at his restaurant.
Others nearby weren’t as lucky.
In 2011, DEP air tests at Gladys Allen Brigham Community Center at 165 East St. showed unacceptable levels of PCE present, chemicals traced back to the site, carried there via groundwater. DEP workers later installed a depressurization system in the community center basement to control the contamination.
DEP spokeswoman Catherine Skiba noted the system’s “continued effectiveness” in reducing the presence of chemical fumes there.
“Dry cleaner sites are notorious because the chemicals they used are nasty and they can migrate,” said Nathaniel Karns, executive director of Berkshire Regional Planning Commission.
That’s why BRPC has set aside $60,000 in brownfields funding money to assess the extent of necessary remediation. The agency already has used $19,000 from these funds assessing the immediate area and other select places.
The city this year applied for additional grant funds from the federal Environmental Protection Agency to further assess contamination in the nearby area, and perhaps begin funding remediation work.
But Pittsfield still does not own the plot. A board of survey comprised of a city employee, an engineer and a disinterested third party recently determined the building “unsafe” and ordered it demolished — a legal action despite the city not owning the plot.
Nathan Joyner, Community Development permitting coordinator, said the city seeks to learn more about the property before taking it in Land Court.
“We are being very careful not to take ownership of it until the money to deal with it is in place,” Joyner said.
“In the long term,” added City Planner C.J. Hoss, “the city would take ownership and the goal now is to turn it into a parking lot.”
Karns also thinks the approach prudent, but it has for years peeved nearby property owners like Arace and Allegrone Cos.
For years the city has been hamstrung in dealing with Stetson because officials wanted to know how much of a headache — and wallet buster — it represents. They won’t take the site until additional environmental testing gets done, and cleanup funds come in relatively small allotments, and have to be spread thin among other local remediation projects.
“The sooner the city can get rid of the Stetson building the better it will be for everybody,” Arace said. “We talk about gateways and things — the Stetson building is the gateway to City Hall, and it’s not a pretty one.”
Hoss acknowledged that — cautious or not — the problem will remain without city action.
“It’s a situation where, if the city didn’t do it, the property would sit there forever,” Hoss said.