Environment Concerns For LTV Laid To Rest

Aired February 27, 2002

During the bidding process for LTV Steel, city and Congressional leaders expressed concerns about potential environmental liabilities. But those worries have now been laid to rest, as 90.3 WCPN®'s Karen Schaefer reports.

Karen Schaefer: The concerns stemmed from what would happen to LTV's Cleveland works if the company couldn't find a buyer or if the new owner bought the mills, only to close them down. In addition to current environmental liabilities - including landfills, air pollution permits, and wastewater treatment facilities - Craig Butler of the Ohio EPA says there's the industrial pollution legacy of more than 150 years of manufacturing.

Craig Butler:We know a great deal of what's going on at the site, but we do not know in total what the liabilities are at that facility. And that is very, very difficult for anybody - including LTV, including the bankruptcy court, including Ohio EPA - to access, because there's never been a kind of comprehensive assessment of what it would take to take that piece of property and return it to a use other than an industrial property.

KS: But with the purchase of the Cleveland Works by the L.W. Ross Company, those concerns disappear. CEO Wilbur Ross says the New York-based investment firm plans to keep making steel. And Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who has led the fight to keep the mills open, says that obviates the need for clean-up.

Dennis Kucinich: The problem we had was if a winning bidder had decided to shut the mill down and left a huge environmental problem on the site for the taxpayers to have to shoulder in years to come. But with an on-going business, the operation of steel, assured through the action of the Ross Company in winning the auction, we're now looking at the possibility of restarting steel production. And any environmental problems that exist at the site Ross has committed to handling. And there are environmental problems that occur as a matter of course - they'll handle those and also any of the other issues out there, they'll be able to deal with.

KS: Under the terms of the sale, the new owner has agreed to assume about $200 million in environmental and other liability costs. Kucinich says most of that money will go to pay off LTV's creditors. $25 million of that money was set aside in LTV's bankruptcy plan to address any immediate environmental issues at all of the former LTV properties in Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. This morning in Youngstown, bankruptcy Judge William Bodah may also decide to award some of that fund to two other environmental claimants. The state of Pennsylvania's Environmental Protection Agency and the city of Buffalo have both sought redress for on-going environmental clean-up at former LTV sites. But Chris Warren, director of Economic Development for the city of Cleveland, says, unless the new company changes its plans, he doesn't anticipate any problems.

Chris Warren: So if they cease operations, there are requirements that take hold. If they don’s cease operations, then the requirements are there, but they're different requirements. They're the standard; they have to operate the plant in an environmentally legal way.

KS: The city has already filed a brief with the bankruptcy court, asking the judge to advise potential buyers of their legal responsibilities under city pollution ordinances. The Ohio EPA plans to file a list of current environmental liabilities at the former LTV works as soon as it's been compiled. So unless the deal falls through - or the new buyer fails to keep the mills open - taxpayers won't be asked any time soon to help pay for clean-up of what Mayor Jane Campbell has called 'the mother of all brownfields.' Karen Schaefer, 90.3 WCPN® News.