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Friday, May 15, 2009

Environment - "Owners say IDEM should pay for manure cleanup"

Updating a long list of earlier ILB entries, including the May 11th "Who cleans up if a hog farm goes bankrupt?" and the May 12th "Millions of gallons of hog manure spilled: State officials believe the discharge might have been deliberate", where the ILB noted that "it appears things have gone from bad to worse", today comes a story readers may have anticipated.

Seth Slaubaugh reports in the Muncie Star-Press:

EATON -- The owners of an abandoned hog farm from which an estimated 4 million to 5 million gallons of manure were released -- causing a fish kill -- are denying responsibility.

The Indiana Department of Natural Resources said 1,017 fish were killed in a ditch into which the manure was discharged from an earthen lagoon at the former Muncie Sow Unit. * * *

It appears that a hole in the dike of the lagoon was deliberately opened up over the weekend by earth-moving equipment.

"We are still looking into it and should know more as staff continue working to gather information," IDEM spokesman Barry Sneed said.

Since 1999, Muncie Sow Unit's owner has been fined more than $22,000 for spilling manure, failing to report manure spills, killing fish and other violations. The corporation is scheduled to be sentenced June 3 for environmental crimes.

Last year, Muncie Sow Unit was bought by John and Becky Moriarity from Grant County. IDEM gave the couple five years to clean out the 12-million-gallon manure lagoon and pits beneath the barns.

Primarily as a result heavy rainfall, IDEM on April 30 obtained a court order to remove manure from the farm to prevent a spill. The manure was being hauled in tanker trucks to an Indianapolis wastewater treatment facility at a cost of 9 cents a gallon.

Then this past weekend, millions of gallons of manure from the lagoon were drained -- apparently on purpose and in violation of the law -- into a ditch that empties to Mississinewa River.

"We were informed that somebody -- I shouldn't say somebody -- that a breach occurred," said Don Dunnuck, an attorney representing the Moriaritys. "There is an investigation as to how the breach occurred, whether or not it was man-made or muskrats or whoever."

"When the Moriaritys bought the farm, it was represented to them by the auctioneer that liquid in the lagoon was an asset, a fertilizer to be applied on farm land, and they thought they had five years to market this product," Dunnuck said. "Then this spring IDEM came in and filed an injunction against them, alleging there was an immediate threat of a spill."

A court granted IDEM authority to remove the manure, reserving the issue of who would pay for it until a later date, Dunnuck said.

"The Moriaritys' position is, they didn't create the problem, and they've got five years to solve it, and if IDEM wants to violate the five-year period, it's up to them to pay for it," Dunnuck said. "That issue has yet to be resolved by a court."

Now that the level of the lagoon has been lowered, "I don't see an emergency any more," Dunnuck said.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 15, 2009 09:35 AM
Posted to Environment