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EPA Places Site in Herkimer County on the Final Superfund National Priorities List

Release Date: 01/19/1999
Contact Information: Rich Cahill (212) 637-3666, [email protected]

(#99008) NEW YORK, N.Y. -- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has placed the Hiteman Leather site, a former leather tanning facility in West Winfield, New York on the final Superfund National Priorities List (NPL). The agency proposed the site for inclusion on the NPL, the federal list of the nation's worst hazardous waste sites, last September. In mid-1996, EPA found high levels of chromium in soils and surface water at the site. Sites that are placed on the final NPL are eligible for long-term "remedial action" financed by the Superfund Trust Fund.

According to EPA Regional Administrator Jeanne M. Fox, "The final listing of the Hiteman Leather site on the NPL will result in a solution that will protect the area's wetlands, surface waters and groundwater. Superfund addresses the serious hazardous waste sites in communities like West Winfield that threaten their health and local environments."

The Agency periodically proposes sites to the NPL and designates proposed sites as final. The total number of federal Superfund sites in New York is now 85, including a new site in Great Neck, Long Island that was proposed for the NPL today. The following is a description of the site on the final NPL:

The HITEMAN LEATHER COMPANY site, on which the company operated a leather tannery from 1820 to 1968, contained a number of buildings (several deteriorating), three interconnected wastewater settling lagoons, a two-acre wetlands area adjacent to the lagoons and a section of the Unadilla River. By 1964, approximately 180,000 gallons of industrial wastewater was discharged from the tannery daily into three unlined settling lagoons on the site, which flowed into the adjacent Unadilla River and periodically overflowed into the nearby wetland. The site has been inactive since 1968, with the exception of the buildings, which were intermittently used for storage.

EPA performed an investigation of the site in mid-1996. In addition to finding high levels of chromium in the surface soil and water, the agency also detected low levels of other heavy metals, pesticides, semivolatile and volatile organic chemicals. A structural evaluation determined that most of the buildings and the stack at the site were structurally unsound and demolition was recommended. The deteriorated buildings were demolished by EPA in the fall of 1996. A remaining building was demolished in the spring of 1998.

The final listing of the Hiteman Leather site was published in the Federal Register today. Members of the public interested in obtaining copies of the notice, an updated NPL list or site descriptions, please contact the RCRA/Superfund Hotline at 1-800-424-9346 or 703-412-9810. Further information about the site and the Superfund program can also be obtained from EPA's homepage: www.epa.gov.superfund.

For more information contact:
Richard Cahill, Press Office