(SitNews) Anchorage, Alaska - The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) recently delivered a report to Congress that details the development and current status of the most comprehensive inventory to date of known contaminated sites on lands conveyed to Alaska Native corporations through the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA). In addition, the report also provides recommendations for fully addressing cleanup of all the conveyed contaminated sites.

Over the years Alaska Native communities have expressed health, safety, and economic concerns related to the presence of hazardous materials or other forms of contamination on lands conveyed to them under ANCSA, which called for the transfer of about 44 million acres to Alaska Native corporations for economic development. The BLM’s comprehensive database is meant to help guide cleanup of contaminated sites across Alaska by identifying, on a preliminary basis, the parties responsible for the contamination, if known; describing whether cleanup has started; and determining what information is still needed to clean up currently unresolved sites.

“By working with Alaska Native corporations, the State of Alaska and other Federal agencies, the BLM has developed a powerful tool to effect change and move toward cleanup of these sites,” said BLM Alaska State Director Bud Cribley. “While the BLM’s role here has been limited to handling the government’s land transactions, we are proud to bring our expertise to this part of the project.”

To prepare the inventory, the BLM started with information found in the Contaminated Sites Program Database, a publicly available source of information developed and managed by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC). Additional database information was obtained from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), U.S. Air Force (USAF), and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Formerly Used Defense Sites (FUDS) program.

In addition, the BLM facilitated nine meetings with Alaska Native corporations across the state to gather input and verification of sites, which was essential to updating and improving the inventory database for the report.

The end result is an inventory with what is known about each site and its regulatory status, including 1) the entity to which the BLM conveyed the property; 2) location of the contaminated site; and 3) the type and amount of contaminants that may be present. Before it can be considered final, the inventory needs to be refined with further regulatory and site characteristics, when that information becomes available. Once finalized, the inventory will provide Alaska Native entities and the appropriate Federal and State regulators with the information they need to help address these contaminated sites.

Here is a summary of the current findings as of September, 2015:

• There were 920 contaminated sites conveyed to an ANCSA landowner, according to ADEC information. Of those, 328 sites have been cleaned up, 338 sites require additional cleanup, 242 sites have sufficient land use controls to prevent human exposure, and 12 sites have no confirmed release of contaminants.
• For the 338 sites that still require cleanup, the ADEC identified, on a preliminary basis, the following entities as owners or operators of the sites prior to transfer:
• Department of Defense: 48% (162 sites)
• State of Alaska and state political subdivisions: 15% (51 sites)
• Private land owners: 12% (42 sites)
• Unknown: 8% (26 sites)
• ANCSA corporations: 6% (20 sites)
• Federal Aviation Administration: 5% (16 sites)
• Non-ANCSA Alaska Native entities: 4% (14 sites)
• Other Federal agencies: 2% (7 sites)
• Ninety-four sites do not appear to be in a cleanup program. An additional 104 sites require further verification and may be added later to this list.
• The BLM had no known contaminated sites on land conveyed to Alaska Native corporations. This is confirmed by data compiled by the ADEC.

Although the BLM conveyed and patented the majority of these lands, it did so while acting solely in a pass-through capacity as the Federal government’s “real estate agent.” Subsequent to transfer, the BLM has no statutory authority to compel or conduct cleanup on ANCSA lands. Once lands are conveyed, full title transfers to the relevant Alaska Native corporation, and there is no existing statutory authority for the BLM to execute or compel cleanup on the conveyed lands. Only the ADEC and the Environmental Protection Agency have authority to compel cleanup on privately owned ANCSA lands.

Congress directed the BLM, through the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act of 2015, to complete a comprehensive inventory in addition to updating recommendations from a previous report completed in 1998.

On the Web:

Read the 106 page BLM Report to Congress (PDF)
Click here (BLM website)

View the Database of Contaminated Lands Inventory on ANCSA Conveyed Lands
Click here (BLM website)

Edited by Mary Kauffman, SitNews

Source of News:

US Dept of Interior - Bureau of Land Management
http://www.blm.gov

 

Representations of fact and opinions in comments posted below are solely those of the individual posters and do not represent the opinions of Sitnews.

SitNews ©2016
Stories In The News
Ketchikan, Alaska

Articles & photographs that appear in SitNews may be protected by copyright and may not be reprinted without written permission from and payment of any required fees to the proper sources. E-mail your news & photos to editor@sitnews.us Photographers choosing to submit photographs for publication to SitNews are in doing so granting their permission for publication and for archiving. SitNews does not sell photographs. All requests for purchasing a photograph will be emailed to the photographer.