Gravel berms at Smurfit-Stone Superfund site hold back contaminated soil and waste ponds from the Clark Fork River. While community members and lawmakers want them removed, the state may not have legal authority to make that happen.
That’s a key takeaway from the Environmental Quality Council’s draft report on the site of the former pulp mill. Some lawmakers believe the berms and series of huge waste pipes in the river are trespassing on state-owned land. But, the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation says that would take years of legal action to prove.
For now, the report doesn’t make any policy recommendations for lawmakers to consider. But council member and state Rep. Jonathan Karlen says it does show the Legislature is committed to staying involved in the cleanup process.
“What the community is doing — what, I think, we’re getting the state to do — is to really push the EPA. To say, ‘We want a full restoration of the site in the most timely way and in the most thorough way,’” Karlen said.
The EPA is conducting another round of ground sampling at Smurfit-Stone. The results from its study will determine how the agency chooses to clean up the site — a decision that may not come until 2028.
