Well, with the cooler weather and a bit of rain every now and then, we really do not have that many brown fields around this year. :-0

Don’t you taxpayers just love paying the clean up costs for former business’s? Wouldn’t want those destitute people doing the right thing, right?

You got it Dragonmaster. One of those hidden subsidies we are paying to industry for not paying for their damages in the first place.

We pay damage deposits when we rent a place …. and, in this case, industry does not. Maybe they figure that is why they had to buy a business license.

Perhaps the City should take a page from the rates they charge to escort services.

“The Treaty 8 Tribal Association in Fort St. John is receiving just over $34-thousand dollars to clean up a former service station lot.”

So if a station closes, it is the company’s responsiblity to keep the lot clean forever until the next business moves in? Seems reasonable. (sarcasm).

Presumably the service station met all the pertinent environmental and all other requirements at the time it was built, as did the lumber mill.

So why should the former owners be on the hook for cleaning up some ‘brownfield’ site, just because those requirements have now changed and the property is now classed that way?

‘Society’ wants to alter the existing rules after the fact, yet expects private businesses who based their ‘business plan’ on rules in place at the time the business started, or expanded ~ rules that were followed and approved by the appropriate government agency at that time, or the business couldn’t have started or expanded ~ to foot the bill for every change based on every current whim and fancy that comes along from government forever? That’s lunacy!

Who in their right mind would ever start any business or stay in one under conditions like that? Yet that, unfortunately, seems to be the direction in which we’re headed. And under a government that’s supposed to be ‘business friendly’, too. The kind of friend that pats you on the back, looking for a soft spot to stick the knife in.

Bingo, socredible.

Government inspectors guarantee nothing. They show up, look around, take some pictures and some measurements and walk away and prepare a report and then file it.

For the next 25 years the owner/manager operate the service station, let us say, and the trouble starts during that time. In fact, it may start right with the backfill when the backhoe hits the tank and nobody knows whether it has been seriously damaged, but they backfill it anyway and pave over the lot.

Or it is simply a matter of corrosion of the tank due to local properties of the soil as well as minimum protection standard of the tank which may have failed during the manufacturing process and even the transportation process. So who is on the hook? The tank provider; the installer; the station which did not monitor potential leakage, etc. Certainly not government at any level.

So here is the current thinking in the legislation regarding contaminated sites:

•a new definition of contaminated sites to clarify that contamination must be in quantities exceeding risk-based or numerical criteria, rather than in any quantity as indicated by the earlier legislation

•use of approved professionals to advise the Ministry on assessment and remediation of low to moderate risk sites, while maintaining full ministry involvement in high risk sites.

•conditional certificates of compliance which were issued for cleanups that met risk-based standards, rather than numerical standards, have been repealed and recognized as full certificates of compliance. This move was made to reinforce the acceptability of risk-based remediation.

•ELIMINATION OF THE ABILITY OF THE MINISTER TO REOPEN CERTIFICATES OF COMPLIANCE DUE TO CHANGES IN THE STANDARDS OF THE REGULATION. The previous provision held owners of a remediated site liable for additional remediation if standards changed. The cabinet retains the power to re-open certificates for other legitimate reasons.

http://greendashboard.dc.gov/Waste/UndergroundStorageTanks

Sorry, forgot to add the most important part:

However, a person will not be responsible for remediation if they can show that they fall within one of the many exceptions.

These are too detailed to list here, but generally exclude individuals who were in no way responsible for the contamination.

In addition, the Minister can determine a person to be a “minor contributor” if the person contributed only a minor portion of the contamination at site. Minor contributors are liable only up to a portion of the remediation costs as determined by the Manager.”

So, now we may understand why the government is funding some or all of the remediation bill. ;-)

Let us try this on for size:

“Presumably the restaurant met all the pertinent health and all other requirements at the time it was opened.”

So why should the owner be on the hook for keeping the kitchen clean if it has been inspected at the start?

In the case of the kitchen, cleanliness and proper storage and cooking temperatures can be observed during any inspection. That may not be the case with the operation of a service station and industrial site until the site is excavated or otherwise explored and tested.

Generally there is no grandfathering when it comes to health and safety.

The 136k is chump change when compared to the amount of money the NDP poured into Skeena Cellulose and affiliated companies to keep them from folding the tent for no other reason than it happened to be the home riding of the forest minister of the day Dan Miller.