The city is spending $80,000 to hire a private sector attorney to represent them in the purchase of the property for the bus barn. Why?My approach to blogging is that I have 8 years of experience serving as an alder, and 1 year being council president. And yet, when I look at materials available to the public, I am left with so many questions. I believe that information from our government should be transparent, publicly available and we shouldn’t need to have to search to get answers to questions that should be easily available to us. Here is a good example – and of course I just read this yesterday, and all the offices are closed today so you can’t call anyone. And even if I did call or email, I’m quite certain they wouldn’t get back to me, or if they did, they’d be instructed in the future not to. So, here is what I know. And I fully realize, I know just enough to be dangerous, so if you have more info, please feel free to leave it in the comments. This is not my area of expertise. Also, when I started writing a blog post about a Finance Committee meeting with this agenda item I had no idea I’d end up where I did . . . such is the nature of things.
WHAT DOES THE RESOLUTION SAY?
Agenda item:
Fiscal Note
The proposed resolution authorizes the City to retain special outside counsel on a non-competitive basis to assist in representing the City’s interests related to environmental risks at the Oscar Mayer site and to pay up to $80,000 for these legal services from the Metro Satellite Bus Facility project (Munis #10950). There is available funding in the project to pay for these costs.
Title
Authorizing the City to retain special outside counsel on a non-competitive basis to assist the Office of the City Attorney in representing the City’s interests related to environmental risks at the Oscar Mayer site.
Body
WHEREAS, City staff is currently negotiating a letter of intent for the purchase of property at the former Oscar Mayer site (the “Property”); and,
WHEREAS, the Property has a history of environmental contamination and the current owners have worked with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources to remediate contaminant; and
WHEREAS, the current owner and former owner of the Property have agreements that prevent additional environmental testing by the City, and the City is seeking to reduce the risk associate with purchasing a portion of the Property; and
WHEREAS, Attorney Arthur Harrington and Godfrey & Kahn, S.C. have the required specialized knowledge and expertise on these specific types of issues having represented numerous parties, including government agencies; and
WHEREAS, under sec. 4.26(4)(a)3., the City may retain services of an attorney without competitive bids; and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the City hereby agrees to retain the firm of Godfrey & Kahn, S.C. and Attorney Arthur Harrington to assist the City Attorney’s Office in representing the City’s interest in reducing environmental risks at the Oscar Mayer site; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the City is authorized to pay for legal services up to $80,000 out of the amounts appropriated for the Oscar Mayer acquisition budget;
AND BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED that the City Attorney shall review and execute a retainer agreement with Godfrey & Kahn, S.C. and Attorney Arthur Harrington on the terms approved by the City Attorney.
REQUEST FOR NON-COMPETITIVE SELECTION
Here’s the full document.
Total Purchase Amount: $80,000
Vendor Name: Godfrey & Khan, S.C.
Reason for the Request:
- Why a competitive selection process cannot be used:
Negotiation for Oscar Mayer site purchase related to the bus barn requires specialized knowledge of environmental conditions and risk assessment. Art Harrington at Godfrey & Kahn is highly qualified and comes with recommendation from local counsel.
- Comment regarding purchases over $50,000
The City of Madison has not done any business with Godfrey & Kahn in the last 5 years.
DIGGING DEEPER
OSCAR MAYER SPECIAL AREA PLAN
What is in the Oscar Mayer Plan Special Area plan about environmental contamination:
This plan is making it’s way through the approval process now:
ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS
The planning area was once predominantly marsh land that was later filled and the industrial uses we know of today began establishing in the following years. The areas former natural state coincides with its high groundwater issues, impacting the ability to build below ground. The areas historical contamination can be associated with the various industrial uses that operated and continue to operate in the area today along with the rail switch yard and railroad lines that cut through the planning area. The management of contaminated soils is a factor that can potentially impact the financial viability of redevelopment and will need to be addressed prior to any redevelopment projects. In 2018, the city experienced an unprecedented amount of rainfall over a short period causing significant flooding of homes and streets. Figure 7 to the right shows properties that are at risk of aerial flooding resulting from storm sewers back up out of the Yahara River, while several other areas not shown on the map experienced urban flash flooding from limited storm sewer capacities. Due to these compounding factors, future development are subject to the City’s updated stormwater regulations.
Lastly, as mentioned in the earlier chapters, a wetland exists on the Hartmeyer private property that’s been of great desire by neighborhood residents to maintain as a conservation area. The areas existing environmental conditions and neighborhood desires were all carefully considered throughout the planning process.
The map mentioned above also shows that much of the area is hydric soils and at risk of flooding.
Midwest Environmental Justice Organization has this article about PFAS in the area and Oscar Mayer’s role in it.
PFAS found in groundwater under former sewage treatment plant
• 910 Mayer Avenue (the northern 16 acres of parcel #081031301013)
• 1201 Huxley Street (the entire 2.5 acres of parcel #081031304033)
• 1910 Roth Street (the entire 1.67 acres of parcel #081031304041)
•Oscar Mayer Former Filling Station East (#02-13-580722)
•Oscar Mayer Former Spice Room BLDG 43 (#02-13-580723)
• General fill and storm water ponds – Aerial photos from the 1950s shows filling of all three properties as well as several historic storm water ponds. Is there shallow soil contamination associated with the fill and ponds that would require management if excavated? Was there any solid waste materials deposited on the properties?
• Per and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) – PFAS contamination has recently been identified at the former Burke Wastewater Treatment Plant located at 1401 Packers Avenue. From 1950 to 1978, Oscar Mayer leased this property for pretreatment of wastewater from their meatpacking plant. To what degree should the City conduct PFAS testing of groundwater and soils on the Oscar Mayer properties?
• 1910 Roth Street – There are only two shallow soil samples from this property, which was formerly the C.E. & P.A. Roth Coal and Fuel Oil company.
• Solvent plumes in groundwater – When the production wells were in operation, the Oscar Mayer facility had a strong downward hydraulic gradient. It is also documented that these production wells were impacted by solvent contamination, potentially from onsite use. Has deeper groundwater on these three parcels been adequately characterized? Are offsite impacts sufficiently understood to be able to limit the City’s future liabilities?
• Field Investigation – The proposer shall complete a utility locate, including locating private utilities. Soil borings, groundwater wells, and vapor probes (if recommended) will be used to evaluate the extent and magnitude of contamination in soil and groundwater. It is assumed that soil cuttings will be thin spread on site and/or returned to the boring holes or test pits. The proposed work will follow accepted practice guidelines for environmental assessments, including EPA laboratory analytical methods, ASTM or All Appropriate Inquiry (AAI) standards, and all Wisconsin WDNR and DSPS regulations.
• Phase 2 ESA Report – The proposer shall prepare a Phase 2 ESA report documenting all sampling activities and analytical results, including stating and depicting the extent (horizontal and vertical) of any identified contamination, identification of risks to human health and the environment, and recommendations for remedial action if necessary. It will include a summary of quality assurance/quality control performance, and an appendix containing boring logs, field data, laboratory analytical data, chain-of-custody records, photograph logs, documentation of proper management of investigation-derived wastes, and abandonment records for boring and monitoring wells, if applicable. The Phase 2 report should include recommendations on how the City can limit its liability when purchasing these three parcels.
Dear Common Council Executive Committee:
We are deeply troubled to learn just today that the Metro plan for a bus barn at the former Oscar Mayer site was added to this special meeting of the Common Council Executive Committee, and is now apparently being considered part of the OMSAP even though it wasn’t before. This is a horrible public process and prevents adequate public engagement.
As I described in my February comments to the Plan Commission, the proposed location for the bus barn is over a plume of extremely high levels of chlorinated compounds, including highly toxic trichloroethylene (TCE) and other volatile organic chemicals. The buildings the city hopes to purchase for this facility were used by Oscar Mayer for plastics manufacturing and solvent extractions to manufacture flavorings for food products.
The DNR and city have known about this toxic plume of chemicals for years. In the late 1980s/early 1990s, the area northeast of the Packers/HW 30 interchange–connected to the proposed bus barn area underground, and also part of the OMSAP– qualified to be placed on the Superfund list. The bus barn area would very likely qualify under Superfund as well.
To date there has been no public engagement about this toxic plume, or other toxic contamination at the OM site, and their myriad public and environmental health effects, some of which will fall disproportionately on people of color and low income people. Have affected neighbors near the site, and especially the most at-risk people, had opportunities to learn about and engage in decisions about this highly contaminated site? We have seen no evidence of that.
Please defer this item to a future meeting. Whether or not the Metro bus barn proposal is going to be considered part of the OMSAP, but especially if it is, then it should go through the same extensive public engagement process included in the OMSAP process.
Thank you,
Maria Powell, PhD
Executive Director, Midwest Environmental Justice Organization Madison, WI 53704
Good morning, Alder Abbas,
I am writing regarding agenda item #4 on the Common Council Executive Committee schedule this evening. The item appears to be an update regarding the Madison Metro transit facility at the former Oscar Mayer site and how it relates to the Osca:r Mayer Special Area Plan (OMSAP).
The agenda item itself is unclear as to the actual nature and depth of the discussion, and so I am writing to raise a few general concerns regarding the bus barn, as well as its relationship with the OMSAP.
You and I both served on the Oscar Mayer Strategic Assessment Committee, and I believe that both of us voiced interest in and heard from our neighbors the desire for the OMSAP to contain dense employment and housing opp01tunities for our neighbors. The bus barn will remove about 1/3 of the developable land in the OMSAP area from re-development, keeping it a parking lot. My Sherman Neighbors and I have repeatedly voiced concerns that this is a poor use of this space, and that our neighbors deserve more. However, as the OMSAP has developed, there has been a curious lack of discussion about the bus barn; we have been told at several public meetings that the bus barn is somehow not a part of the plan. How can 1/3 of the plan area not be part of the plan?
I sincerely hope that the Metro facility request will now be considered in the context of the OMSAP, and that the development of the no1thern 1/3 of the prope1ty will be held to the same standards, defined by the community process, as the rest of the plan. The community needs to know not only how the land will be used and to have input on this process, but we also need to better understand the underlying contamination that we all fear is festering beneath the concrete.
I also would ask that the bus barn as well as other major capital purchases be re-reviewed versus the harsh budget atmosphere that the City is ce1tainly entering, as well as the obvious and necessary refocusing of our community on developing people, not places.
Thank you for your time in hearing my concerns. I look forward to listening to this evening’s discussion. Renee Walk
Sherman Neighborhood Association Co-Chair
To: Common Council Executive Committee, All Alders, and Mayor’s Office:
We on he Northside of Madison were surprised this morning to learn that someone at city hall has made the decision to suddenly add the Metro’s plans for a “bus barn” to the Oscar Mayer Special Area Plan (hereafter, OMSAP) at the eleventh hour (OMSAP had been slated for Common Council review and approval next month and has been making the rounds of various city committees for several months). This evening’s Common Council Executive Committee is discussing this with some kind of presentation from Tom Lynch at Metro (see agenda attached). I am not finding any documents included in the Legistar file for this agenda item, are there any?
Unlike the general OMSAP, there has been virtually no public process on these Metro issues other than a sprinkling of small-group presentations.
Metro and City Hall have often not been responsive to requests for information about this and related questions. For example, there has been no response to date to any of the issues raised in either of my memos sent in March of this year to the City Finance Committee and Mayor’s office (attached above). Among other significant concerns, there bas no response to concerns that OM Building 43 where Metro has been proposing to relocate most Metro operations is located directly over the former OM “Spice Room.”
In combining Metro’s plans with OMSAP as indicated on the agenda, it appears that the city has done a total 180 on this issue now by abruptly moving this Metro issue into the OMSAP process. This raises many questions, including those in the attached email from Renee Walk, our Sherman Neighborhood Association co-chair. I share Renee’s concerns, particularly concerning the need for transparency about the process, the need for public input, and the need for complete answers to the many unanswered questions which have been directed to Metro and City Hall but which have so far gone unanswered.
Thank you for your time and attention.Dolores A. Kester, Attorney Emeritus, Kester Law Offices
COMMON COUNCIL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEETING
Here’s the agenda. This is the first tiem – item number 4 on the agenda. It took about 50 minutes on the agenda that lasted on 57 minutes.
Public Comment
Dolores Kester thanks them for bringing this to the public’s attention. She sent the email with her concerns. We need public transparency about these issues and public input, so thank you for beginning that by having this session this evening.
Beth Sluys agrees with Dolores, appreciates the Executive Committee for looking at this proposal for the north side of the Oscar Mayer site. She says throughout the Oscar Mayer process, the metro facility was always outside of the Special Area Plan process, so she was surprised to see it – she is glad it it being raised now, the public feels strongly about issues related to the bus facility from subsurface contamination to toxic gas infiltration systems that are being installed at building 43 currently, to hazardous waste that sits open on the site, the roll off boxes full of contaminated items, soil, oily pipes, we’re not sure what’s in those, a tanker car sitting out at the corner of Packers and Commercial that had to be secured behind fencing. She is hoping the city will come up with a way to have improved oversight as well as the RFP that didn’t go out last year to do a Phased 2 study.
(Ahhhhhh . . . sounds like Beth knows more than I could find!)
Tom Lynch the Transportation Director has an update. (His audio is choppy so its a little hard to hear everything, this is a summary – not verbatim) He agrees the process has gone slower than they would have liked and the current owner would have likes. They initiated pursuit of this property because it was the most cost effective. And with the possibility of $7M in federal funds that was attractive. However, it is a brownfield, a complicated site. It’s a former industrial park. In some ways that is good, its economical but there are challenges. The current owner (Reich-Rabin) is committed to closing out the DNR BRRTS sites, doing remediation. The speaker alluded to some of the things they are doing with building 43. They owner’s agreement with Kraft when he purchased it prevents him or us from doing further testing. Madison would like more tests. Even tho they are committed to closing the BRRTS site, there are issues – particularly with building 43 (or 53?) but they are prevented from doing that without them breaching their contract. They will mitigate their risks through the agreement they would have with them. They had hoped to have the agreement before the council in early 2020 but this has become very complicated. Because of this they want to hire an environmental attorney, it will be introduced at the June 16 council meeting and have it approved at the July 14th meeting. The want the attorney to help them take advantage of a cost effective site and not take on additional risks. There will probably be an escrow account we can draw on once they are in control of the site and additional remediation is necessary. The remediation concerns exist with or with out Metros use of the property. If Metro did not take possession then some other industrial user, perhaps a distribution facility would be using building 50 or building 43 and then these same concerns would exist. Currently the city has no control of the site, its totally in the hands of Reich-Raven and they are in control of remediation efforts. If we were to obtain control of the site, if we purchased it, we believe we would be a responsible player and I think that is evidenced by the fact that we want to do additional testing and we want to make sure it is a safe place for workers. When you think about the types of uses that could be used from warehousing to distribution facilities or office buildings, or residential, we feel like storage and maintenance facility it a reasonable re-use for a site that has the concerns that exist at Oscar Mayer. He says Brynn Beamus who is a hydrologist and Matt Wachter could provide perspective on other purchases they have made of industrial properties.
Syed Abbas asks if this is all of the presentation from the city staff? Lynch says he has a plat of the area, he wouldn’t say that the presentation is dynamic, but it is ongoing. We’re interacting with Reich-Rabin once a week, we’re interacting as a team once a week and we’re trying to determine the next steps.
Abbas says you may have seen some emails and you can see I requested this presentation or update and the reason is that the Oscar Mayor Special Area Plan is moving forward, going through a feedback process at the moment. At the same time the building has the desire to purchase building 40 and 53, right. Lynch says 43 and 50. Building 43 is the one which is highly contaminated. Lynch says 43 is the spice room, it does have a vapor concern and they are mitigating them and he can give more information regarding that. Initially Metro hopes to use building 50, that is our current 50 and we know less about building 50 and that’s where we want additional tests. Abbas says the reason he asked for the update was to start the process of public engagement, so the public knows what is happening since the Special Area Plan is moving forward. The public is concerned about the most contaminated place in Oscar Mayer and they want to know how this will impact their life and to make the process transparent. He appreciates they came here. His first question is about the contract, he says he knows Reich and Rabin told the city they have a contract with Oscar Mayer and under that contract they cannot give access to the city to do level 3 testing, the city cannot perform any testing on the property, they can do testing and remdiation or removal, but the city cannot get involved until the city purchases and then the city can do testing. Lynch says that is what they have said.
Abbas says the next questions is, if this is true, is there any way we will get more information about this particular arrangement, because if I hear this arrangement, it looks like Heinz brothers knew that site is extremely contaminated and that is his reason, it might be speculation, that is the reason they put that in the contract. Is there any way we can get more information on that agreement.
Matt Wachter the Director of Planning, Community and Economic Development, says for context we are in the middle of negotiations, so we don’t have our full team here so we can’t answer everything, we would normally, in the course of discussing real estate negotiations, be at the finance committee and we would have brought the city attorney and the real estate agent, and if we were going to get into some of the finer points of real estate negotiation we would have noticed the meeting to be able to go into closed session if we were be going to get feedback about how to negotiate. He says he wants to put that out there before they go too far down the list of questions that we as staff might not be able to answer all of them tonight. We have been working with Reiich-Rabin to get more information and they have indicated they are bound by contract with Kraft Heinz as to what they can give us.
Abbas says that he thinks its important for the alders to have the process transparent and we should know what is happening. He asks if when the city purchases a building, a brownfield, what steps do you usually take?
Wachter says that they should ask “the other Matt” as well as Brynn as to how this has gone when we have purchased other industrial projects.
Abbas says he also wants to know about phase 1 and phase 2 testing. If you can also elaborate what is phase 1 and phase 2 and which stage we do that when we purchase brownfield.
Matt Mikolajeski says the city has used different approaches to purchasing brownfield property, depending upon different circumstances. When they purchased the old Don Miller car dealership property on E. Washington Ave, we didn’t do any environmental assessment before we purchased the site, we knew there was some contamination on the property but it was an opportunity for the city to acquire those sites and we knew there would be opportunities through applying for EPA funding and through TIF to clean up what was there and that’s what transpired. We purchased the property, we did a better job of characterizing the type of contamination that was there, we applied for funding and utilized TIF to clean up the site. Another recent example was the purchase of the portion of the MG&E property for the Capital East District Parking Garage, now called the S. Livingston structure. In that case MG&E has done some environmental study, we weren’t entirely satisfied with what they did, we then went ahead and prepared some additional environmental due diligence work, completed that work and then moved forward with purchasing the property. There has been other situations where in the case of Union Corners where we had a partnership years ago between the developer and the city to clean up the property. There was a point in time where we gained title to the property back. And there was still some contamination that required to be cleaned up. It’s really varied depending upon the circumstance of the purchase and what we perceived to be the contamination there. But there is precedence for moving forward with a purchase without fulling knowing 100% what was present on the site.
Abbas says his question was about brownfield and industrial area, like Oscar Mayer which historically from phase 1 and DNR we know there is quite a bit of intense contamination, like the building Tom Lynch mentioned, the building 43 is extremely contaminated, especially with the ? contamination. Brynn can you please explain the contamination and put them in the scale of the city history, if you have seen those types of contamination in other places which Matt mentioned. First explain what contamination are there and how big they are, and if you have found similar contamination in other projects with city purchase or not.
Brynn Bemus says that when the city buys commercial/industrial properties, phase 1 is a hsitorical document review and phase 2, which is what is being contested here, is where you take soil and ground water samples. On the Oscar Mayer site, the portion we are interested in buying, there is an open site with the DNR, the main contaminant of concern is chlorinated solvent called tricholoethylene (TCE) and the biggest concern is that if you vapors in the soil it can go up through the foundation of a building and you can breathe it in. It’s a fairly high concern, its also a very well understood contaminate and because it is open with the DNR its going through the DNR remediation process. They are not just mitigating it, which means making sure it doesn’t impact people, they are actually going to install a soil vapor extraction system. It’s perforated pipes that will go underneath the building and they will apply a strong vaccum to it and they will suck the contaminated vapor out of the soil and put it through a filter and in that process aerate the soil to the point where it should break down the contamination that’s there or remove it. That’s the first approach to ensuring the safety of building 43, in addition to that, there’s going to have to be testing in side building 43 to ensure that its working – that there aren’t other vapors coming up. Understanding how the soil vapor system is going to be operated, maintained and tested and eventually closed out, that will all be part of our (condo?) agreement with Reich-Rabin to ensure that there is safe indoor air quality for employees, that is something that we will guarantee. She says we haven’t bought a ton of properties with open containment sites on them, but they did recendtly buy the Sands property which was part of the Central Park or McPike Park and that had known contamination on it as well.
Abbas asks if there is a possibility that the contamination has spread beyond building 43 in large plumes?
Bemus says Reich-Rabin conducted their own phase 1 as well as a fairly extensive phase 2 where they took soil and groundwater samples across the site. Based on those results they gave the data tot he DNR and the DNR opened up three new sites, one is a petroleum site and 2 of them are these chlorinated solvent sites , so its definitely a possibility this chemical got into the ground water. The groundwater testing they did around the building they have not seen an indication of it as spreading laterally or very deep. Surprisingly the groundwater results around the building are actually pretty good. One thing that might be working in our favor is that for a long time Oscar Mayer operated its own production wells and as a result that created a very strong downward gradient for ground water – whereas in other parts of the city ground water contamination might move laterally in a plume, most contamination there seems to move down. The good thing is that it is not impacting the shallow water which is what will impact vapor intrusion into buildings.
Abbas says we all know the plume has been spreading for decades underground via storm an sanitary drains because those drains are attached historically, for the sake of the health of the residents, did the owner do any investigation on the plumes and potential exposure to the residents and workers. Or is that something the city will do?
Bemus says with regard to groundwater contamination, there is no indication that there is shallow ground water that is contaminated that is leaving the property and that is what would be a concern to residents. There is a deeper plume of another chemical that did go south towards the Demetral landfill but that was between 150 and 250 feet deep, so that is not a public health concern. It’s not great, but its not an immediate concern to human health. Ideally the city does Phase 2 work before we buy a property, however in this case we can’t. We have already enrolled the Oscar Mayer site in our EPA brownfield assessment program. The city was awarded $300,000 a year ago from the EPA to conduct these exact types of investigations and we’ve done a Phase 1 which we can release to anyone who is interested. And then we have come up with what we would like to do for a phase 2 and can use that grant money to pay for the phase 2 once we purchase the property.
Abbas asks if once they purchase and do phase 2 and if we find a major contamination after the city investigation, who will pay for that cost.
Bemus says that is a good question. Right now we are planning on hiring a very well esteemed environmental attorney who is going to help us structure an escrow account so the escrow could pay for it. In addition, because we are a local government unit, as a city we get certain protections from the state for buying contaminated properties and that is one other way the city can protect itself. And last of all, even tho Kraft Heinz has sold this property, they owned the property for 100 years and they are still considered a responsible party so that might be a last resort if we had to go that way.
Abbas asks what is escrow and how does it work, do we have any historic example where city buy a brownfield and we did those type of arrangement? Bemus says this a question for the Matts.
Wachter says they use escrow accounts for a variety of things in transactions to cover unknown costs, fees that aren’t fully established. This is probably the first time they used it for environmental in particular, but it is not uncommon to do transactions with escrow accounts, which basically is part of the closing where a certain amount of the sale price goes into a segregated account for a certain amount of time and after we figure out what the final issue is going to be, the money can be drawn down to pay for that. For example, we used these at city owned Center for Industry and Commerce where there is road work being done and we kind of know what the charge is going to be but we aren’t going to know until after the buildings are constructed and at that point money gets drawn from that account to pay for some of this work from the sales proceeds. It’s a tool to manage the unknowns of real estate.
Abbas says he has been in several presentations about why this location was picked and the cost effectiveness, would this situation with contamination where the owner of the property is not allowing the city to do its own independent investigation – he has a deep concerns about how historic contamination in Oscar Mayer will cost us later – have you done cost analyses. Hypothetically, where will be stand on this project, knowing the existing contamination, how much will that cost the city with escrow.
Bemus says they have taken that into consideration for the northern portion that we are going to buy outright. The north part of the site, north of the two buildings, we’re going to buy that outright and we are just assuming by default that we are going to have to landfill everything we escavate from the site, so we have come up with some plans of a mock up building, a typical slab on grade building, we’ve calculated what quality of soil is going to come out and we understand those landfill costs and we have good estimates for that.
Abbas asks about the letter of intent that will go to Common Council eventually, will both directions be mentioned in that letter, like what kind of role the city is going to do in removing the contamination, because I never seen letter of intent from the city as a new alder, how its written, especially with a brownfield.
Wachter says the letter of intent will outline the purchase price, to what extent the escrow agreement, the dollar figure, what is eligible cost for process to figure out how money is drawn from that account. That is actively being negotiated and we are working to bring the attorney on who will specialize in that piece, so he doesn’t think they know exactly what those are going to look like.
Abbas asks if they read the City’s 2019 RFP there is a reason to do PFAS testing at the site because it was found at the Burke City site, which Oscar Mayer used for years, are we going to do PFAS testing, did the owner do PFAS testing or not.
Bemus says there has been no PFAS testing on the Oscar Mayer site that they have seen and she doesn’t know yet if they will recommend it. The levels that have been found at the Burke plant, relatively speaking, compared to what is coming from the airport are pretty low. She doesn’t know yet if they are going to recommend doing PFAS testing once they get to they stage of actually firguring out what the phase 2 would look like specifically.
Abbas says that the whole east side is suffering through PFAS at the moment and these are the huge concerns he is hearing from his constituents and everyone is talking about PFAS. he would highly encourage city once we get into that space to look into PFAS testing too. Because the PFAS is still there, it might be the quantity is not there, but its still there.
Bemus says when it comes to contamination the important thing is the exposure pathway and so with the East Side people were concerned about being exposed through drinking water and fish consumption or through touching creek water. That is something we will have to weigh, but I hear your concern.
Abbas asks about the Reich-Rabin contract about not allowing city to do phase 2 testing, he trusts the city process and we have more oversight in the city work, not having those reports in front of us, is there a possibility to get access to that contract.
Wachter says that they have seen their phase 2 and the results of it. He asks if Abbas wants to see the agreement between Kraft-Heinz and Reich-Rabin? He doesn’t think they are willing to share it, we can go back and talk about it. I guess I don’t remember exactly what they said when we had this discussion before.
Lynch says they are not willing to share that, I think they believe that is a contract between them and who they purchased it from and they don’t feel its a public record document.
Abbas asks about the Burke site, Oscar Mayer used that site for years and there is a contamination they found there, and would in phase 2 would we do the whole analysis of sewer system and the Burke and try to see how far the contamination is spread?
Bemus says if we do a phase 2 on Oscar Mayer, it will have to be restricted to the Oscar Mayer site and MG&E they did PFAS testing and environmental testing when they bought the former Burke plant – unfortunately testing can only go so far, ideally some of this information would come out in a Phase 1, having an understanding of how they used the plant and how much volume went there, but we are beyond that, there is no one else to interview and we’re not going to get any more information out of Reich-Rabin, so I don’t know what else we would find out in terms of the relationship between Burke and Oscar Mayer.
Abbas says that is also true that the City is not bound by what the DNR tells us, we can still for the sake of public health, we can still do big PFAS testing and make sure public health is safe and water is safe to eat fish and food. Can’t we?
Bemus says “of course”
Abbas says that his one question was about overall Oscar Mayer Strategic Asssessment is moving forward and DNR also mentioned some contamination on the Hartmeyer property, if we purchase this 15 acres, would we be able to see the whole area as a whole, on the other part of the Oscar Mayer Strategic Assessment Plan or will be just be contained to the 15 acres.
Bemus, says with regard to the environmental study it would just be on the land that we own, the condo parcel and the lot we are buying outright. We can’t do any testing on Hartmeyer, tho we did reach out today to our contact with the Hartmayer Estate and asked if they were interested in being part of our EPA brownfield grant because we think it would be a great property and its free to the owner, but so far she only knows what is showing up in the Phase 1 reports she has looked at and what is on the DNR’s website.
Abbas asks if there is a possibility we can get the MG&E data that you mentioned before, about their testing.
Bemus says that for PFAS she can send it to him, its on the DNR website.
Abbas says that a majority of these questions are coming from residents who are living close by and have a lot of concerns about their health and contamination and also they have concern about building 43 because union workers and public transportation will be there in the future and all we can look after them. He says if this project moves forward and we don’t purchase the 15 acres for any reason, would still we have an opportunity if when we do TIF district and we use TIF money could the city use that for an environmental assessment for phase 2.
Bemus says not on private property unless they give us access.
Abbas says regardless if we use our TIF money, for any project, we cannot do any sort of testing.
Mikolajewski says that we can use TIF funding for environmental assessment but Brynn’s point is we can’t use TIF funding to go onto a private property and do testing without the permission of the property owner. Just as Brynn mentioned before, right now we have EPA funding and we’re working with property owners throughout the city who may want to utilize that to do additional testing on their property, we could do the same with TIF. but we just need the permission of the property owner to do that.
Abbas thanks them and says its important for his fellow alders and community to hear those questions and get an understanding of what is happening with the project.
Alder Rebecca Kemble asks when they will bring this before Finance Committee. Wachter says that the contract for the Environmental Attorney it is moving its way through so we can get them onboard and they will work on the escrow and environmental protection piece. We are continuing to work our engineering colleagues are working with the designers and engineering on their side to figure out the exact scope of what Reich-Rabin would need to do before they hand the building over to us. Some of it is just removing equipment, some of it is to make the salable condo, the firewall between us. We’ve been working for months with them to scope out what they are going to do, what’s going to fall on the public works contracts. We were hoping to have it done already, but that hasn’t happened, we’ve been moving a little slower so he hopes by the end of summer, we would have the LOI between us.
Kemble says the LOI will come to finance? Wachter says “yeah”. End of the summer? “That’s the hope.”
Lynch says this has been going slower than they wanted, he would like to be an optimist but he is becoming a realist. This is complicated, that is why we are enlisting extra help, we would like to have this introduced by the end of summer, but it could hit fall, we fully expect this to be transparent, it will go before council, refer to finance and then back. This will be a transparent process.
Abbas says thanks again.
WRAP UP
Man, I wish I had just watched CCEC in the first place, would have saved me a lot of searching around . . . but I eventually got there. Good thing they started recording these meetings and the video was accessible.
