EPA Orders Valley Business to Pay for Water Cleanup

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered several San Fernando Valley businesses to either pay $500,000 or find another way to keep chromium-contaminated groundwater out of the local water table. The press release identifies four companies and three trusts subject to the order: Los Angeles By-Products Company; Pick Your Part Auto Wrecking; Waste Management; and Hawker Pacific Aerospace; the Wagner Living Trust, the Basinger B Trust and the Basinger C Trust. A $1.3 million voluntary settlement was reached by the EPA earlier in the year with Honeywell International, Lockheed Martin, Calmat and California Car Hikers. The companies that are now being ordered to pay opted out of that settlement agreement. The EPA is using the settlement funds to construct and improve the wellhead treatment system for the North Hollywood region of the Superfund site.