
DATE: Saturday, August 9, 1997              TAG: 9708090322

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MARC DAVIS, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:  101 lines

NORFOLK SETTLES ``TOXIC STEW'' LAWSUIT CITY DOES NOT ADMIT BLAME FOR CONTAMINATION

The city will pay $75,000 to a businessman whose land was contaminated by a nearby city-owned toxic waste site.

The city, which tried last week to keep the settlement confidential, released the agreement Friday.

The city does not admit responsibility for the contamination on Monticello Avenue, near downtown. But it has agreed to pay $75,000 to Frank and Peggy Spicer, owners of Frank Spicer Co., a restaurant supply business across the street from the toxic site, to settle a lawsuit.

The Spicers still have a claim against Virginia Power, which allegedly created the toxic mess decades ago, but hasn't owned the property since 1970. The lawsuit seeks $15 million. A trial is scheduled for Aug. 18.

Another lawsuit over the same issue - filed by another nearby landowner against Norfolk and Virginia Power - is also pending in Norfolk Circuit Court.

How the toxic stew got there, and how the 13 acres became an unusual city parking lot, is not in dispute.

The lot sits on Monticello Avenue, between Virginia Beach Boulevard and Princess Anne Road. It is bordered by two cemeteries and Young Terrace public housing. It appears in the middle of nowhere, about a mile from the tall buildings of downtown.

The city paved it in 1995. Facing Monticello, it has a long, semicircular driveway, wide concrete steps and a series of bus shelters. The asphalt is surrounded by a heavy brick-and-iron fence, dotted with landscaping and trees.

Underneath is a poisonous dump.

The problem began more than 100 years ago. Starting around 1853, before the Civil War, illuminating gas was manufactured on the site. Virginia Power took over the operation around 1930, then shut it down and dismantled the plant in 1968.

The city bought the Virginia Power site in 1970. It previously owned half the site.

In July 1995, the city paved the property and created the parking lot to stop rainwater from running through the land and contaminating groundwater.

Five months later, in December 1995, Frank Spicer sued the city and Virginia Power. He claimed the toxic waste - mainly buried coal tars and ash - had contaminated his property across the street and posed a health hazard to him and his employees.

``This is the most dangerous compound known to man,'' Spicer's attorney, Michael F. Imprevento, told a judge in June. He said toxic contamination seeping into Spicer's land ``have rendered the property worthless.''

A nearby business owner, auctioneer Calvin Zedd, who owns a warehouse and office on Monticello, filed his own lawsuit against Norfolk and Virginia Power in October 1996. The suit seeks $3 million.

Zedd said he has smelled gas from the dump for 12 years, the entire time he has been there, but especially after the city paved the lot. He says his property is now worthless.

``I can't sell the property,'' Zedd said Friday. ``No bank in the world would loan me a nickel on it.''

According to Spicer's lawsuit, the city knew 12 years ago that toxic contaminants from the site had infiltrated Norfolk's groundwater, but did not tell anyone who lives or owns property nearby.

In 1985, during construction of a sewer line, the city uncovered hazardous waste buried at the site and soon learned that the groundwater was contaminated, the lawsuit says.

Spicer claimed that his property was first contaminated by flowing groundwater. Later, Spicer claimed, toxic gases seeped into his building after the paving because they had nowhere else to escape.

The city settled its part of the case July 25, but did not release the settlement until Friday.

At first, the city tried to keep the settlement confidential. ``There are other potential plaintiffs out there. We don't want them to know,'' Bernard A. Pishko, chief deputy city attorney, said last week. ``If certain people knew the specifics of it, it would not help us if we had further negotiations with anybody.''

The city released the settlement after receiving a request from The Virginian-Pilot under the state Freedom of Information Act. ILLUSTRATION: The toxic land problem began more than 100 years ago.

1853 Illuminating gas is manufactured on the site.

1930 Virginia Power takes over the gas manufacturing operation and

then shuts it down.

1968 Virginia Power dismantles the plant.

1970 Norfolk buys the site, located on Monticello Ave. between Route

58 and Princess Anne Road.\ July 1995 The city paves over the

site with a parking lot.

December 1995 Frank Spicer sues the city and Virginia Power,

claiming the buried toxic waste, mainly coal tars and ash, has

contaminated his property.

October 1996 Businessman Calvin Zedd sues the city and Virginia

Power for $3 million.