136th Year... and
still on the job!
Wednesday April 7, 2004
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136th Year... and
still on the job!
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Wednesday April 7, 2004
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A permit for the first stage of the weapons destruction program at the Pueblo Chemical Depot has been developed by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
Area residents will have a number of opportunities to learn about and discuss the program over the next few weeks.
The draft permit, if approved, will allow the contractor team led by Bechtel to survey the site, do grading and drainage work, install underground utilities, pave roads and build support facilities for the plant.
The plant itself, still in the design state, will require further permits.
Little opposition to the permit is expected since it was local governments and environmental groups that convinced the Army to abandon plans for an incinerator and use a cleaner, water-based method to destroy the 2,600 tons of mustard agent in explosive cannisters stored at the depot.
The United States also is required to destroy those weapons by 2012 under an international treaty.
Local officials also are anxious to see the $1.5 billion project get underway. It will mean more than 1,000 construction and long-term jobs and will hasten the Army's departure from the depot, which is being developed as a civilian industrial area.
Quick approval of the state air permit also could help members of Colorado's congressional delegation who are fighting to restore fiscal 2005 funding for the Pueblo project, money cut from the Pentagon's budget recommendation.
A public hearing on the proposed permit has been scheduled from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, May 26, at the Pueblo Convention Center, 320 Central Main St., Pueblo.
The public hearing will be preceded by several public informational meetings:
5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 28, at the Pueblo Convention Center.
7 p.m. on Tuesday, May 11, at the Boone Town Hall, 100 Baker St., Boone.
6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, May 12, at Avondale Water and Sanitation District office, 321 Third St., Avondale.
Copies of the draft permit and other documents are available on the Department of Public Health and Environment’s Web page and locally at the Avondale Water and Sanitation District, the Boone Town Hall and the Robert Hoag Rawlings Public Library, 101 E. Abriendo Ave.
Written comments should be sent to Doug Knappe, leader, Chemical Demolition Unit, Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Division, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, 4300 Cherry Creek Drive South, Denver, CO 80246-1530.
For more information about the project, please contact or write to Jeannine Natterman, a Hazardous Materials and Waste Management community relations specialist assigned to Pueblo Chemical Depot cleanup work, at (303) 692-3303, or toll-free outside the metropolitan Denver area at 1-888-569-1831, Ext. 3303. Written inquiries to Natterman should be sent to the health department address above.
ON THE NET:
Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment at www.cdphe.state.co.us/hm/pueblochemdemil.asp