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Item: Mine waste deal huge: Nearly $600 million allotted to CdA Basin/Becky Kramer, SR
More Info: Cleanup of mine waste in the Coeur d’Alene Basin got a $583 million shot in the arm Thursday, when Asarco Inc. agreed to settle environmental claims at 80 toxic sites around the nation. Asarco paid $1.8 billion to settle the federal government’s claims in 19 states as part of a 4-year-old bankruptcy proceeding. The payment is the largest recovery in the history of the federal Superfund program.
Question: What does this settlement mean to you?
D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.
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Lizard_People on December 11 at 8:23 a.m.
Awesome! We need the economic boost now, but our grandchildren will also thank us for cleaning up our toxic waste.
Arpie on December 11 at 11:34 a.m.
I know this is a broad brush statement but: This is the kind of settlement you don’t see much when there is a Republican in the Whitehouse. Good job EPA.
spokelooneh on December 11 at 1:34 p.m.
“Federal attorneys spent more than 50,000 hours preparing the government’s case against Asarco. ”
At $200 an hour, that would be a cost of $10M, for a return of $1.8B. Nice return on investment.
deepee on December 12 at 6:21 a.m.
What a load of rubbish. Works out to $50,000 for every man, woman and child in Shoshone County. We’d rather have our mining jobs back, but EPA won’t let that happen, either