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Saturday, September 12, 2009

Environment - More on: City of Richmond may soon own contaminated Dana site

Updating this long list of ILB entries on cleanup of the bankrupt Dana Corp.'s Angola and Richmond sites, Bill Engle of the Richmond Palladium-Item reports today:

The city of Richmond will take ownership of the former Dana Corporation property on Williamsburg Pike later this month.
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The city has reached a tentative agreement with officials at the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to have the city take ownership of approximately 44 acres once owned by Dana so IDEM can proceed with the cleanup of the former manufacturing site.

"(IDEM) reiterated that the reason they want us to take ownership is so they can go in and clean up the property," said Tony Foster, city director of Metropolitan Development. "This will give us an asset we can market and hopefully get back on the tax rolls."

IDEM officials approached the city this year with the plan to get the property cleaned up, sold and returned to the tax rolls.

IDEM in its letter to the city listed Keith Sharp as the previous owner, while city records show that a limited liability corporation owns the property.

Wayne County took over the property when the owner stopped paying property taxes on it. The property went through a county tax sale Oct. 7, 2008, but was not sold, which allowed the county commissioners to transfer it to Richmond.

Officials at IDEM in a letter in late August said they would allow the city to take ownership before state officials send the city a "comfort letter" that would guarantee that the city would not be held responsible for the cost of the cleanup.

Amy Hartsock, IDEM spokeswoman, said the state agency will use funds from the settlement of the Dana bankruptcy to pay for the cleanup.

She said IDEM wanted the city to own the property so the previous owner would not benefit from the cleanup.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on September 12, 2009 12:06 PM
Posted to Environment