AMY J.

GALLOWAY
Direct Dial: 954.760-4938
Email: ajgtrippscott.com
Via email and U.S. Mail: bnorman@wplg.com
Bob Norman
Local Channel 1 0
3401 West Hallandale beach Blvd.
Pembroke Park, FL 33023
May 31,2012
Re: Sun Recycling and SWS Response to Bob Norman's emails of May 23 and May 25, 2012
Dear Mr. Norman:
At the request of our clients, Sun Recycling and SWS (the "Companies"), the following
is provided in response to your email of May 23rd regarding a soil test you said you had
conducted at Treasure Cove. This correspondence also addresses the questions raised in your
email of May 25th regarding the at the Lake Worth landfill hurricane debris storage and staging
project.
Treasure Cove
From review of the May 23 email, it appears that you and/or others (identified in the
email only as "we") accessed the private Treasure Cove residential development and through
some unspecified process obtained a soil sample. You state that the soil sample was tested by
Florida Spectrum Environmental Services and that the lab results show arsenic levels of 3.07
parts per million. No other information is provided as to the alleged "testing" other than it
appears to have been delivered to Florida Spectrum on May 18 and analyzed on May 21. Of
particular significance to the Companies and counsel is the statement attributed to Abron Farache
that "he and the company [Sun] tricked the County and never really cleaned up the bulk" of
unpermitted RSM previously delivered to the site.
As a preliminary matter, the Companies strongly object and disagree with the underlying
premise of your email, to wit: that Sun was caught illegally dumping RSM and that Sun did not
comply with the remediation plan developed by the Broward County Department of
Environmental Protection ("BCDEP"). Both of those statements are incorrect.
As Channel 10 previously has been advised, Sun Recycling was cited for receiving,
depositing and utilizing recovered screen material (RSM) from construction & demolition
(C&D) debris processing prior to it having been tested and approved by BCDEP for that use.
Treasure Cove was the site identified in a Notice of Violation as the recipient site of the
unpermitted RSM. Mr. Farache was the individual who supervised that facility at the time and
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11 0 Southeast Sixth Street, Fifteenth Floor Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33301
Post Office Box 14245 Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33302
Tel 954.525.7500 Fax www.trippscott.com
Fort Lauderdale Tallahassee
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sold the fill to the developers of Treasure Cove. Upon receipt of the Notice of Violation, the
Companies immediately cooperated fully with the BCEDP to resolve the matter. That
cooperation included split sampling testing at the site (samples were split and tested by BCEDP
and by an independent environmental engineer hired by the Companies); development of a
County approved remediation plan and full performance of that plan, which included removal of
the screened fill in all the locations requested by the County and replacement with clean fill. Mr.
Farache took part in every aspect of that corrective plan, including attendance at on-site meetings
with the County representatives and the environmental consultants, as well as development and
submission of the remediation plan and supervision of the actual remediation. Mr. Farache also
attended the final meeting with the County where they approved the settlement and signed the
final settlement document which expressly stated that the remediation plan had been successfully
completed.
The allegation that the remediation was not fully performed, i.e., that the screened fill
was not taken from the site, is not true. The County expressly found that the remediation had
been performed and the County inspector, who had approximately 20 years experience at the
time of this investigation, testified he believed that the RSM material that was supposed to be
removed was removed and he confirmed that the County would have required proof of that
removal to sign off.
As Channel 10 has also been advised, Abron Farache and the Companies have been
involved in litigation arising from his prior association with Sun Recycling. In 2004, the
developers of Treasure Cove filed a lawsuit against the Companies making the same allegations
that Abron Farache allegedly has made to Channel 10. Specifically, he alleged that in 2000 -
2001, the Companies delivered unpermitted fill to Treasure Cove and the subsequent remediation
was not properly performed. In the course of discovery, it was determined that not only was
Abron Farache the source of the falsehoods regarding Sun's performance of the remediation
plan, but that he also had financial ties with the Treasure Cove developers, to whom he had
loaned money in the past and who owed Farache a considerable amount of money when they
filed suit. The lawsuit was ultimately settled and a confidential Settlement Agreement was
entered into that resolved all matters, including the primary claim fabricated by Abron Farache
that Sun had failed to adequately "clean up" the unpermitted RSM that had been delivered. The
Companies refused to release or otherwise include Abron Farache in the Settlement Agreement
as it was made quite clear in the course of discovery that Farache was the source of
misrepresentations and falsehoods about the Companies that had been asserted in the Complaint
and during the course of the litigation.
With respect to the testing undertaken by the Companies in defense of the Treasure Cove
claims and the issue of arsenic levels raised by your email, the Companies provide the following
information, prepared with the assistance of Dr. Christopher Teaf.
1
1 Dr. Christopher M. Teaf is the Associate Director of the Center for Biomedical & Toxicological Research at Florida
State University and the President of Hazardous Substance & Waste Management Research. He holds a Ph.D. in
Toxicology, a M.S. in Biological Science and a B.S. in Biology and is a Fellow, Academy of Toxicological Sciences.
He has extensive experience in the evaluation of potential effects from chemical exposures in many industries,
including waste management.
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In order to investigate specific allegations related to designated lots in Treasure Cove, a
total of 20 soil samples were collected and analyzed in December 2007 and January 2008 from
each of those lots. These 20 samples were collected at five locations and from four depth
intervals at each location: (a) 0 to 6 inches below land surface (BLS); (b) 6 to 24 inches BLS;
and, (c) each 2 feet until the water was reached (2 to 4 feet BLS and 4 to 6 feet BLS). This
discrete protocol is consistent with that required by Chapter 62-780, Florida Administrative Code
(F AC). All of the samples were collected, preserved, labeled, documented, and shipped to the
laboratory consistent with Florida DEP Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) protocol as
required by Chapter 62-160, F AC. Collection, handling, and documentation of samples
according to these protocols are essential to the ability to draw any valid conclusions from such
data.
Conclusions of the chemical analysis and visual inspection of those Treasure Cove soil samples
can be summarized as follows:
Based upon visual evaluation of the subsurface soil samples, the subsurface soils
consisted of tan, gray or brown sand that was consistent with regional natural conditions
(black, brown, tan or yellow quartz sands). The soil samples clearly were not indicative
of Recovered Screen Material (RSM). Emphasis added.
Soil samples exhibited levels of metals (e.g., arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead,
mercury, selenium, silver) which at all locations and at all depths were less than the DEP
unrestricted Residential Soil Cleanup Target Levels (SCTLS) as published in Chapter 62-
777, FAC. From this it can be concluded that the property was safe for unrestricted
development.
The analysis of the subsurface soil materials performed for the designated lots indicated
minor exceedances of the FDEP Residential Direct Exposure SCTL for one of the
polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) categories, defined as benzo(a)pyrene
equivalents. Soil samples with these levels of benzo(a)pyrene equivalents are extremely
common in urban environments as a result of their presence in petroleum products,
asphalt road paving materials, and atmospheric deposition of particles from many
combustion sources. From this it can be concluded that these soils look like typical urban
soils. The presence of other petroleum hydrocarbons in addition to the PAHs (e.g.,
toluene, xylenes, ethylbenzene, trimethylbenzenes) indicates that the observed organic
contaminants are the result of vehicle parking and storage on the designated lots,
associated with the leakage of fuels, oils, and other petroleum compounds. There is
evidence from historical aerial photographs and from the 2007/2008 site investigation
that vehicle storage occUrred on these lots on a regular basis.
Soil samples exhibited levels of a variety of pesticides which at all locations and at all
depths were less than the DEP unrestricted Residential Soil Cleanup Target Levels
(SCTLS) as published in Chapter 62-777, F AC. From this it can be concluded that the
property was safe for unrestricted development.
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Leaching tests of the soils from each lot did not exhibit a potential to release substances
to groundwater.
Turning to your reported May 18 soil sample result, collection of a single soil sample
from an unspecified location, by unspecified methods, under unspecified conditions, cannot be
expected to be a reasonable representation of present conditions. Explicit and defensible
documentation of sampling location, preservation/storage/handling procedures, and chain-of-
custody from sampler to transporter to laboratory, and quality assurance/quality control backup
are among the crucial elements that must accompany any sample for it to be properly evaluated.
In this instance, it isn't clear what the single uncharacterized sample indicates. Relatedly, given
that testing was done over 10 years after the unpermitted RSM was delivered to the site or the
remediation plan was completed, the obvious question arises as to what other uses or
development occurred at the location of your sample, wherever that was collected.
Finally, the arsenic value you reported in your note (3.07.mglkg) is well within the range
that would be common in coastal sand in the southeast Florida area. The natural occurrence of
arsenic in the aquatic environment is usually associated with shelly, sedimentary rocks of marine
origin, and uncontaminated coastal area marine sediments typically contain from about 5 to 15
mglkg dry weight arsenic. Sediments from Biscayne Bay and other Florida estuaries contain
natural background levels of arsenic ranging from less than I 0 mglkg to 60 mglkg or more.
Arsenic concentrations reported along the Atlantic coast of Florida are consistent with previous
investigations which concluded that arsenic is preferentially deposited in coastal and estuarine
sediments, in association with shell fragments derived from mollusks and crustaceans having
high part per million (ppm) arsenic levels.
As a point of comparison, Dade County DERM published a natural mean background
concentration for arsenic in soil of 1.2 mglkg, with a range of <0.2 to 3.89 mglkg). Several other
studies have reported that arsenic concentrations in soil from South Florida area are significantly
greater than those from other parts of Florida. Based on data from these studies, for example,
Dade County has the highest geometric mean arsenic levels in surface soils for any Florida
county, exceeding 7 mglkg. Nonurban, relatively undisturbed background soils in Southeast
Florida exhibit a geometric mean arsenic level of2.81 mglkg (range 0.32 to 112 mglkg).
Lake Worth Landfill Hurricane Debris Storage and Staging Project
In your May 25 email, several stylistically inciting "questions" are posed of the
Companies with respect to the hurricane debris storage and staging project that Sun undertook at
the closed Lake Worth landfill to provide hurricane debris removal and recycling services for the
City of Lake Worth and several other local municipalities in the event of a hurricane. The
Companies operation of the hurricane debris storage and staging area was done in compliance
with an Operational Plan approved by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection
("FDEP") and in accordance with a Lease Agreement with the City of Lake Worth. Lest there be
any misunderstanding, there was no "dumping" ofRSM/solid waste and no contamination or any
other event that required "clean up". RSM was utilized to construct access roads, to construct
earthen berms for visual barriers, and to construct a certified compactive layer separating the
hurricane storage and staging operation from the underlying closed landfill. Pursuant to the
Operational Plan, in the event of a severe hurricane, the site would then be ready for and utilized
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for several activities:
construction and demolition debris ("C&D") and vegetative material (yard and
landscaping debris) would be brought to the site for processing and chipping of
vegetative debris; processing of C&D debris;
recyclable materials were processed and shipped off-site; and
C&D residue (non-RSM) was shipped off-site.
No RSM was "dumped" on the site. In fact, during the lease term the site was not activated
because there were no severe storms. All of this was set forth in the Operation Plan, developed
by the Companies and independent engineers and approved by both the City of Lake Worth and
FDEP.
The controversy, such that it is, is politically motivated. Factions within the Lake Worth
political community are trying to create a controversy and claim that former officials at the City
of Lake Worth made a mistake or were "duped" when they allowed the project to go forward.
This is simply not true. Sun did not deceive the City of Lake Worth or anyone else regarding
this project. Sun did not create or contribute to "elevated levels of arsenic" in an aging city
landfill.
In closing, with respect to the allegations involving the Treasure Cove property, notice is
given to you and to Channel 10 that any representation or position broadcast by Channel 1 0
alleging or implying that Sun Recycling, in "cahoots" with Ahron Farache or otherwise, did not
fully perform the obligations set forth in the County's approved remediation plan regarding
Treasure Cove is false. Any publication to the contrary is in reckless disregard of the actual facts.
With respect to the Lake Worth landfill hurricane debris storage and staging project, notice is
given to Channel 10 that any representation or position broadcast that the Companies have
contaminated the Lake Worth landfill or otherwise "dumped" or engaged in unauthorized or
illegal dumping at the Lake Worth landfill is false, and any publication to the contrary is in
reckless disregard of the actual facts.
Very truly yours,
~
Amy J. Galloway, Esq.
AJG/ksb
cc: Bill Pohovey via email bpo ovey@wplg.com
David Boylan via email at dboylan@wplg.com
Bruce Rogow, Esq. via email at brogow@rogowlaw.com
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