At a hearing this week, Sen. Mary Jo White, chair of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, requested Auditor General Jack Wagner do an audit of the Hazardous Sites Cleanup Fund to determine how monies in the Fund have been spent.

At the same hearing, Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Kathleen McGinty told the Committee that $40-45 million is needed annually to properly fund the state’s Hazardous Sites Cleanup Program.

Sen. Mary Jo White (R-Venango) invited Secretary McGinty before the Committee after Senate members expressed concern over apparently conflicting statements on when the Hazardous Sites Cleanup Program would be shut down and because the Secretary refused to answer a letter from the Senator asking for information about the program.

The Hazardous Sites Cleanup Program is responsible for supporting approximately 285 DEP employees, pays the state’s share of federal Superfund site cleanups, serves as the Commonwealth’s primary tool to respond to toxic spills and releases affecting local residents and helps remediate brownfield sites for reuse.

Secretary McGinty said $40-45 million is needed to fund the program with about $6.3 million used to pay the Commonwealth’s share federal Superfund site cleanups and maintenance and for emergency response, $9.3 to $36 million used for site response and remediation depending on how many active sites are open and about $12 million went for personnel costs.

Sen. White and Secretary McGinty discussed the reasons behind several announcements at different times since December 2006 the program would shutdown and DEP would furlough employees due to lack of funding.

As a result of the discussion at the hearing, Sen. White wrote to Auditor General Jack Wagner to ask for an audit of the Fund requesting that he focus on these areas:

· Amount of funding necessary to meet federal obligations, such as Superfund;

· Use by the Department of funds held in reserve to meet basic obligations of the fund;

· Carryover of funds from one fiscal year to the next;

· Examining personnel and other programs costs which are “charged” by one DEP program to the HSCA fund;

· Collection and deposit of fees authorized under the HSCA Act; and

· Ensuring uses of fund are generally consistent with those authorized under section 902 of the HSCA Act.

Secretary McGinty supported the audit request.

Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi (R-Delaware) and Sen. White recently announced their intent to introduce Senate Bill 1100 (not online yet), which will provide funding for the Hazardous Sites Cleanup Program.

Under the proposal, $15 million would be transferred to the program for the current fiscal year from existing legislative accounts. Additionally, $40 million annually would be made available for the next three fiscal years from the existing Capital Stock and Franchise Tax, the source of funding for the Hazardous Sites Program for the 12 years prior to 2002. Senate Bill 1100 would not affect the commitment of Senate Republicans to phase out the Capital Stock and Franchise Tax by the end of 2010.

In February Gov. Rendell proposed a $2.25 per ton increase in municipal waste disposal fees to fund HSCA that did not gain legislative support in the House or Senate. In fact, House Bill 1206 (Surra-D-Elk) establishing the $2.25 municipal waste disposal fee was recommitted to the House Rules Committee this week after being on the House Calendar for months.

The Committee is chaired by Sen. Mary Jo White (R-Venango) and Sen. Ray Musto (D-Luzerne).

An online video of the hearing is available on the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee webpage.

NewsClip: Hazardous Site Program Barely Going Official Says

Legislators Work on Funding for Hazardous Waste Cleanup

9/28/2007