Pennsylvania Environmental Law & Brownfields Lawyer & Attorney : Fox Rothschild Law Firm : Philadelphia PA

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I had the chance to speak today with Troy Conrad, the Director of PADEP's Land Recycling Program.  On the same phone call, I spoke with Jill Gaito (Deputy Secretary, Office of Community Revitalization and Local Government Support) and Tracey Vernon (director of the brownfield action team), but there will be more about those conversations in later posts.

As many of you know, Troy recently replaced Dave Hess, who is now retired.  Since not many people outside the Department know Troy, I asked him to talk about his background.  According to Troy, he started at PADEP in 1993.  At that time, he worked in the Southcentral regional office in Harrisburg in the ECP program, dealing primarily with storage tank facilities and tank owners.  He was working in that program during the time that Act 2 was enacted and the regulations and technical guidance were put together, so he has some perspective on the transition that occurred.  He then moved to the regional water program and worked on permit issues, so he has some background in understanding the integration between permitting and remediation.  He later moved to the Chapter 105 program in Central Office. 

Troy views the move to being director of the Land recylcing Program as a "great opportunity".  One of the things he likes is "the idea of working toward the common goals" of environmental protection and economic development.

I asked Troy if he's encountered any difficulties in taking over the Land Recycling Program.  He pointed to succession planning, which is a common concern to large organizations, but is more pronounced in state government.  There have been many work force retirements at PADEP, and those include senior staff within the Land Recycling program.  Also, when HSCA funding was delayed last year, a number of important positions could not be filled.  Troy is now working on filling those vacancies.  He sees that as vitally important to improving customer service. 

Troy is also interested in building strong and productive relationships with the regional office ECP managers and program staff.  He views the regional ECP managers as his peers.  He wants to better understand the issues that they are dealing with, and he plans to use the quarterly ECP managers meetings as ways to develop consistency, where possible, in state implementation of policies developed as part of the Land Recycling Program. 

I asked Troy whether people in the regulated community are continuing to submit Act 2 questions for Central Office's response and later incorporation on the brownfield webpage.  That process was used frequently by Troy's predecessors (Tom Fidler and Dave Hess) at earlier stages in the development of the Land Recycling program, and later when issues arose concerning the interpretation of the clean fill and vapor intrusion guidances.  The Q&A is still posted on the Department's website and provides very helpful information.  According to Troy, the flow of general questions has dropped off considerably.  He thinks one reason for that is that the Land Recycling program is now a mature program.  He also thinks people are working with the ECP staff in the regional offices who are very helpful and knowledgeable.  He said he thought it was always best to try to resolve day-to-day implementation questions at the regional office level, involving the regional ECP manager, as necessary.    While he's willing to entertain questions about regional inconsistency or improper application of Central Office guidance and policy, he said that the most constructive way of resolving some of the trickier issues is to work with the regional office ECP manager. 

Troy said that "75% of the emails he receives now deal with UECA."  And that's not surprising, since it is the hottest Act 2 topic of the day.  With regard to UECA, Troy said that the Department expects a break in period of about 6 to 12 months.  He expects that the Q&A that was recently rolled out will be expanded as new questions flow into the Department and new answers are developed and posted over the next 8 to 12 weeks.  At some point, the Q&A will be folded into an "interim guidance" that would involve some form of public notice and comment, and ultimately the interim guidance would give way to a rulemaking that resulted in new regulations, as authorized by UECA.  I expect to have a further discussion with Troy on how he sees that process developing and the part that those in the regulated community can play as the process moves forward. 

Troy said that it is his understanding that "UECA was not intended to supplant the substantive aspects of Act 2. "  He's hoping that the actions the Department takes can help alleviate the concerns being expressed and reduce the anxiety level that some people are experiencing over UECA.   With that said, both he and Jill Gaito believe that there are benefits to UECA in terms of strengthening public acceptance of institutional and engineering controls.   As Jill said, "the last thing the Department wants to see is some catastrophic failure" of controls that could lead to a lack of confidence in the Department or in the Land Recycling program, and I share that sentiment.  My concern is that Act 2 needs to continue to be a vehicle that promotes economic development and we need to avoid the situation where the addition of UECA's requirements turns developers away from Pennsylvania brownfield sites (especially sites in urbanized areas with off-site groundwater migration) that would otherwise have been redeveloped under Act 2 in the absence of UECA. 

As noted above, I also had a chance to speak with Jill Gaito and Tracey Vernon.   Jill and Tracey mentioned that Senate Bill 1062, which is modeled after a very successful program in NJ in which remediators can obtain reimbursement of up to 75% of their remediation costs, is now moving through the Senate.  I'm going to follow up on that and speak with the bill's sponsor, Senator Rob Wonderling, and contact the program staff in NJ to get more information.  From what Jill and Tracey were saying, it sounds like it could be a very useful funding mechanism, and new funding would be extremely helpful, because the popularity of ISR funding historically leads to shortfalls, especially leading up to the close of the fiscal year.    

I thank Troy, Jill and Tracey for giving our readers some added insight into what is going on with the Act 2 program.  Here's hoping the program continues to grow and prosper.  It's in good hands.