[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 137 (Wednesday, September 6, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12678-S12679]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                  SMALL BUSINESS AND SUPERFUND REFORM

  Mr. PRESSLER. Mr. President, I wanted to bring to my colleagues' 
attention the concerns of several prominent South Dakotans regarding 
the Superfund Program.
  Like many of my colleagues, during the August recess, I spend 
considerable time back in South Dakota talking to my constituents. 
While in South Dakota, one issue came up on a number of occasions: 
Superfund reform. This issue is important to small business men and 
women throughout South Dakota. In fact, several South Dakota small 
business leaders just launched a new coalition, South Dakotans for 
Superfund reform. Recently, the coalition leadership's comments on 
Superfund, and an op-ed from Rob Wheeler of Lemmon, SD, were published 
in local newspapers in the State. I ask that these articles be printed 
in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. PRESSLER. We all agree that the current Superfund Program does 
not work. It is one of the most expensive environmental programs on the 
books. Despite the vast amounts of taxpayer dollars that are poured 
into the Superfund, the program has a very low success rate. One of the 
prime causes of this low success rate is a confusing and costly 
liability system. This system is unfair to small businesses and 
encourages excessive and costly litigation.
  I am encouraged by the draft proposal drawn up by my esteemed 
colleague from New Hampshire, Senator Smith. As chairman of the 
Superfund, Waste Control, and Risk Management Subcommittee, he has 
assumed the daunting task of rewriting the existing Superfund law. I 
look forward to working with him to create a new Superfund law based on 
fairness and common sense. We should not insist on a system that calls 
on small businesses that complied with past laws and regulations to 
shoulder the burden of cleaning up our hazardous waste sites.
  I believe these newspaper articles represent not only the concerns of 
South Dakota small business leaders, but of all small business men and 
women across the country. They are the innovators who collectively make 
our economic engine run. For that reason, we must take these concerns 
to heart as we reexamine the Superfund Program.
                               Exhibit 1

        [From the Argus Leader (Sioux Falls, SD), Sept. 5, 1995]

           Message to Clinton Clear--Reform Superfund Program

                          (By Rob L. Wheeler)

       I attended the White House Conference on Small Business in 
     June--one of about 2,000 entrepreneurs and business owners 
     from across the country invited to Washington by the Clinton 
     administration.
       At the end of the four-day event, the White House asked us 
     to put together a list of the most important steps the 
     federal government could take to really help small 
     businesses. One of the top recommendations may come as a 
     surprise: overhauling the Superfund program.
       Superfund was created by Congress in 1980 to clean up the 
     nation's worst hazardous waste dumps. Fifteen years have 
     passed since then and more than 1,300 Superfund sites have 
     been identified by the Environmental Protection Agency. Over 
     $20 billion in government and private sector funds has been 
     spent. But only 6 percent of those sites have been cleaned up 
     completely.
       With a record of failure like that, it's no mystery why the 
     Superfund is nearly universally regarded--by 
     environmentalists and business owners alike--as the single 
     most ineffective piece of environmental legislation in 
     history.
       Why is the Superfund such a hazard for small businesses?

[[Page S 12679]]

       It starts with the Superfund's liability scheme called 
     ``strict, retroactive, joint and several liability.'' 
     Retroactive liability means a small business owner can be 
     held responsible for action that took place before the law 
     has passed. Even if you didn't act negligently, even if you 
     followed every law and regulation completely--you're still on 
     the hook. Joint and several liability means the company can 
     be forced to pay 100 percent of the cost of cleaning up a 
     Superfund site even though it was only responsible for a 
     small fraction of the pollution.
       With marching orders like that, you can guess the EPA's 
     standard operating procedure: Find any organizations even 
     remotely connected with a Superfund site; then drag them into 
     court to make them pay the clean-up bill. So far, over 20,000 
     small businesses, hospitals, towns, and community groups--
     even a Girl Scout troop--have been stamped as ``polluters'' 
     by the EPA and face potentially crippling legal liability.
       All that litigation costs money--a lot of money. More than 
     20 percent of all Superfund dollars get spent in the 
     courtroom, not to clean up the environment. That translates 
     into an incredible $6.7 million in lawyers' fees and court 
     costs per Superfund site. No wonder the EPA keeps about 500 
     lawyers on staff just to work on Superfund liability issues.
       So our first recommendation for Superfund reform is 
     repealing retroactive liability for waste disposal prior to 
     1987, when small businesses were first required to keep 
     detailed disposal records. The conference also recommended 
     changing ``joint and several liability'' to proportional 
     liability, so those liable would only pay to clean up what 
     they're responsible for.
       Another recommendation was that Congress should require the 
     EPA to use ``sound science and realistic risk assessments'' 
     in identifying toxic sites and establishing cleanup 
     standards. That just sounds like common sense; you'd thing 
     that danger to health and safety would be the only criteria 
     for selecting Superfund sites. But you'd be wrong. Today's 
     EPA standards are so seriously flawed that according to a 
     recent federal government study, more than half of the so-
     called hazardous sites on the EPA's National Priorities List 
     don't even pose a threat to human health.
       There are several other reforms on our list, but they all 
     share a common goal: creating a new Superfund that focuses on 
     cleaning up the environment, not harassing innocent 
     businesses. These reforms have a good chance of passing 
     Congress, but the Clinton administration--which asked for our 
     recommendations to begin with--is now resisting.
       Recently, a group of business and civic leaders from across 
     the state got together to form South Dakotans for Superfund 
     Reform--a grass-roots coalition dedicated to the type of 
     Superfund reform we proposed to the White House. Our goal is 
     to work with South Dakota's elected representatives in 
     Washington to fix Superfund this year.
       There are currently four Superfund sites in South Dakota, 
     including one that has been on the EPA's list for more than 
     10 years. And 15 small businesses and other organizations in 
     South Dakota have been targeted by the EPA. Unless Clinton 
     and Congress fix Superfund, those busineses--and the jobs 
     they provide to South Dakotans--will remain in jeopardy.
       The Clinton White House should be on notice. If it's 
     serious about helping small business, it needs to stop 
     blocking Superfund reform. Washington conferences on small 
     business are fine. But real action speaks a lot louder.
                                                                    ____

              [From the Rapid City Journal, Aug. 24, 1995]

                 S.D. Group Criticizes Liability Rules

                             (By Dan Daly)

       The 1980 Superfund law was a good idea gone awry, according 
     to a group of business people who launched a political 
     coalition called South Dakotans for Superfund Reform.
       The environmental cleanup program has become expensive, 
     ineffective and unfair, coalition members said Wednesday.
       Just 15 percent of the nation's 1,355 sites on the 
     Superfund priority list have been cleaned up, according to 
     the group's literature, and half of Superfund dollars go to 
     lawyers and regulators.
       But the group's main complaint was about the retroactive 
     liability rules that place blame for pollution--and the job 
     of paying for cleanup--on companies and landowners ``remotely 
     associated with a hazardous waste site,'' according to the 
     group.
       ``The reality is that this . . . involves innocent 
     landowners, innocent new businesses that come onto a site 
     unknowing about these things,'' said Carol Rae, state 
     chairman of the coalition's steering committee. ``What we 
     want to do is establish reasonable rules and limits on 
     natural resources damages.
       ``It's not that any of us here are out to say that we do 
     not want environmental protection or to be responsible 
     corporate or private citizens,'' said Rae, vice president of 
     external affairs for Chiron Corp., parent company of Magnum 
     Diamond Corp. in Rapid City.
       None of the business people at Wednesday's news conference 
     are themselves liable for Superfund cleanup projects. In 
     fact, only a handful of South Dakota sites have been on the 
     Superfund list.
       Their interest, said Rae, is as taxpayers and regulated 
     businesses.
       Rae, Kroetch and Rob Wheeler of Wheeler Manufacturing in 
     Lemmon, who was also at Wednesday's news conference, served 
     together as delegates to the recent White House Conference on 
     Small Business.
       Rae said the conference delegates identified some 2,000 
     issues important to small business. Changes in Superfund 
     laws, she said, ranked fifth on the list.
       She and seven of the group's steering committee members 
     held a news conference in Rapid City Wednesday to outline 
     their position. Members ranged from Richard Krull, manager of 
     the Merillat Industries particle board plant in Rapid City, 
     to Art Kroetch, president of Scotchman Industries in Philip.
       The group itself was organized by Steve Knuth of Sioux 
     Falls, who is working for the National Coalition for 
     Superfund Reform. Knuth formed a similar group earlier this 
     year to push for changes in product liability laws.
                                                                    ____


        [From the Argus Leader (Sioux Falls, SD), Aug. 25, 1995]

                Superfund Reformers Start Group in S.D.

       South Dakotans who want Congress to change the nation's 
     hazardous waste cleanup program, called Superfund, have 
     organized to promote reform.
       South Dakotans for Superfund Reform represents people of 
     various business and community backgrounds with ``the desire 
     to see an end to Superfund's unfair and punitive liability 
     system,'' said committee chair Carol Rae of Rapid City.
       The group announced its plans Thursday at a Sioux Falls 
     news conference.
       Congress enacted the Superfund law in 1980. Since then, the 
     Environmental Protection Agency has placed more than 1,300 
     sites on its National Priorities List, but has cleaned fewer 
     than 15 percent of them. More than $25 billion in public and 
     private money has been spent on the program--nearly half 
     mainly on lawyers and bureaucracy, Rae said.
     

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