| Rialto in Fight with County, Files Lawsuit, Gonzales Denies Fault |  |
| Thursday, 28 September 2006 | |
| RIALTO By Cheryl Brown The City of Rialto announced that this week they filed a lawsuit against the County of San Bernardino saying they breached the terms of the Development Agreement it signed with the City allowing for the expansion of the Mid Valley Sanitary Landfill in 1998, a charge that is flatly denied by supervisor Josie Gonzales. "We haven't gotten any word of this from the City. We are taking care of our problem and I didn't promise anything to anyone, but I want to help them," said Gonzales. The issue is complex. According to Gonzales, the city has two plumes of perchlorate one caused by leaching of a landfill and an aggregate user who's leach ponds on county land washed Perchlorate into the water table, the other caused by three or four other users who left contaminates leaching into the groundwater (Goodrich, Black & Decker, Earnhart and the Federal Government's munitions storage area). The County has taken responsibility and erected a treatment plant to treat the edge of the plume from the landfill and the Robert's Ready Mix wash ponds area; however the other plume is growing and the city council voted to allow the Goodrich Company, one of the contributors to the other plume, to give them $1 million dollars to delay even looking at the problem for two years. This is coupled with another one million given to each of the three other signators (City of Colton, the Fontana Water Company, and West Valley Water District) who are all a part the agreement for any settlement that will come from the polluters. "The County's legal response has been to actively add to Rialto's mounting legal and investigative costs. We estimate between $25 and $30 million has been spent to defeat the efforts of Rialto and Colton to force polluters to clean up the mess they left in our drinking water supply," said Owen. "We have a stack of legal documents showing Mr. Moskowitz, the County's Attorney, is the leader of the Joint Defense Group that is leading the defense of actions of the polluting corporations and agencies against Rialto, said Owns. "Not true he (Moskowitz) is no leader in this. We are not defending polluters we are efficiently defending County taxpayers against the lawsuit brought by Rialto, said Gonzales, and the county has only spent $2 million in legal fees for the suit that was filed before I came into office," she said. "Rialto is filing this lawsuit because of the County's unfortunate unwillingness to negotiate in good faith about the costs Rialto residents have paid for the investigation cleanup and water treatment to remove contamination leaching from the landfill into our water supply," said Robert Owens, Rialto's City Attorney in a press release. The (1998) agreement requires the County to pay attorneys fees and expert costs incurred by the City in defending legal actions arising out of the operations of the landfill, including contamination of the underlying groundwater, which is Rialto's drinking water supply source. The Landfill is leaking perchlorate into the City's drinking water supplies," said the Owen press release. "The county has been responsible. In 2000 as soon as the County realized the perchlorate was leaking, it was stopped as soon as we found the wash ponds that the Roberts' Company were using was flushing the perchlorate out of the soil. We have been cleaning up our part. We have put in a treatment plant and we have cleaned up the water and we continue to clean up the water. We have paid the city any money that they had to spend to replace the water for their residents. The investigation that he speaks about has nothing to do with the County. They are the ones who filed a lawsuit and it would be irresponsible for us to use taxpayers dollars when we are taking care of our responsibility. We do not owe them any money. There is no evidence of damage to the city," said Gonzales. Gonzales said she continues to look for the solutions to the problem and that she hasn't given up. In her desire to find a solution she tried to sell a county property close to the Milligan Landfill and thought it would fetch enough to get started on the second plume, that idea did not pan out because they could not get the asking price for the property so that idea failed. "Just because one solution failed it doesn't mean that we are not working to find another one," she said not accepting blame for anything that has happened in this current dispute. "We even went to Washington to get the funds and we were told by Baca, Lewis, Feinstein and Boxer that the only way they could support the effort is for us all to work together under one umbrella. After we returned Rialto tried to exclude one of the partners. I can't undo it. Filing the lawsuit just takes us further away from getting federal funds to clean up the Perchlorate," said Gonzales. "They know they are trapped and I can't change that, I feel for them," she said. She said that the Rialto gave Goodrich a free pass. Goodrich gave each of them a million dollars to make the problem go away and now they are just beginning to look the problem." Owens was not available at presstime to respond to Gonzales' statements.
BS Ranch Perspective: Here we go again! It seems that The City of Rialto is determined to fight there way to non payment of their fair share of the clean up of the perchlorate from the Ground water pumping stations, they have fought every turn of every corner, and this time filing a law suite, rather then the County and the City, along with the City of Fontana, and San Bernardino and Upland I might add should all work together and spread the cost evenly across their pumps. That is what they did before. What troubles me is this, Why is it that Fontana, or San Bernardino, or Upland have any problems with the Perchlorate in their water, did they magically get paid to treat it out of their wells? or is it because Rialto is being Ripped off in some way? I am still at a loss on this. I wish I was as smart as Owens, and Garcia It just seems to me that Rialto is afraid to pay for the business that resides in Their city that has been part of the pollution problem. Red Devil, was using the bunkers for storage of Said Fireworks, and they were placing in the bunkers that which was causing the contamination, Gun Powder in the water level. They were allowing that which was getting into the water to flow down into the water table and then causing that which is now known as Perchlorate Pollution. I suppose that which the City of Rialto was not responsible for should not have to pay for it, but if that were the case they should be going after that which is or was storing their fireworks in the bunkers. Red Devil, and Freedom Fireworks, which are one and the same today! That is who the law suit should be after now! not the county then if it was the devil that caused the poisoning. WORK TOGETHER!!! BS Ranch |
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