Pollution Settlement Continues To Drag On

Residents who have waited years to be compensated for pollution from the old Asarco copper smelter here have a few more months to wait.

Nearly 8,000 people have filed claims asking for a cut of a multi-million dollar class-action lawsuit settlement, said attorney Eileen Concannon. But about half of them failed to include enough proof that they lived near the smelter during the period covered by the suit.

As a result, the company that’s sorting through the claim forms is bogged down, said Concannon, an attorney with Graham & James-Riddell Williams, the Seattle law firm that filed the suit in 1993.

“They were shocked that so many claims were filed … and it’s taking longer than they had anticipated,” she said.

The company will send out letters soon asking for more information and documents to corroborate the questionable claims. That means the first checks, which were expected in April, probably won’t arrive until September, Concannon said.

The 67-acre smelter on the Tacoma waterfront is on the Superfund list of the nation’s most polluted spots. A century’s worth of arsenic and lead fallout from the smelter also contaminated nearby neighborhoods, where the federal government is overseeing a $30 million cleanup of about 600 yards.

The class-action suit, which covers a much wider area, argued that the federal cleanup doesn’t go far enough and doesn’t compensate residents for years of nuisance and exposure to dangerous chemicals.

Under the settlement, qualified residents will share in at least $10 million, to be distributed in three allotments: $5 million this year; $3 million by the spring of 1998; and $2 million in the fall of 1998.

The total payoff could climb as high as $55 million, if Asarco wins ongoing legal battles with insurance companies.

Some residents say they’re frustrated - but not surprised - by the delay.

“I don’t know when, if ever, anybody is going to get anything out of this,” said Linda Searcy, who has lived in North Tacoma near the smelter since 1980. “If I wind up with $100, I’ll be really surprised.”

The settlement was announced in February 1995. At that time, attorneys predicted the first payments by that summer. But the date for the checks to arrive has repeatedly slipped.

Until the total number of valid claims is tabulated, it’s impossible to predict how much people will receive, Concannon said.