PV Fire Dept. Awarded $300K Settlement in Contractor Fill Dumping  

A $300,000 settlement has been reached between the Putnam Valley Volunteer Fire Department, the contractor and a recycling facility in connection with unauthorized dumping of fill at the construction site of the new firehouse.

Over the next six years, John Adorno of Universal Construction and Metro Green, LLC of Mount Vernon will pay the money to the fire department. The settlement was announced last week by the department, ending almost two years of contentious counterclaims and court filings that could have resulted in protracted and costly litigation.

Legal action brought by the fire department accused Adorno and Metro Green of transporting and dumping 17,000 cubic yards of contaminated soil and fill in 2016 to 218 Oscawana Lake Rd., the site of the new firehouse.

The department waited almost six years before filing the lawsuit against Adorno and Metro Green. Filing of the legal action coincided with the discovery of local contaminated water wells at properties near the dumping site.

In Jan. 2023, the Putnam Valley School District filed a lawsuit against 20 chemical companies for allegedly contaminating the elementary school’s drinking water, seeking to recoup funds the district paid to install and monitor a new filtration system.

The elementary school is a half-mile down the hill from the firehouse site. A short distance farther south on Oscawana Lake Road water contamination was also found in wells of 98 homes at Floradan Estates.

The 2016 dumping of hazardous waste was within an Aquifer Protection Zone and done without a permit. The illegal dumping was classified by the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) as a violation. The fire department paid a $5,000 fine in Jan. 2019.

The cost to clean up the site cost taxpayers about $1.4 million. The year-long remediation project started in 2020.

The lawsuit against Adorno and Metro Green sought reimbursement for the clean-up costs.

“We’re extremely happy that a settlement was reached without going to court,” said Bruce Johnson, chairman of the fire department’s Board of Directors. “We wish we had gotten more through negotiations but that is what we came up with.”

Johnson noted the settlement has cost the fire department about $275,000 in attorney fees, court and deposition fees and expert witness and consulting fees. The remaining $25,000 from the settlement will go back into the fire department’s general fund.

Under the terms of the agreement, Adorno and Metro Green will make a combined lump sum payment of $126,000 within 30 days of the Dec. 6 settlement. Adorno will pay $90,000 and Metro Green will pay $36,000. Over the next five years, Adorno will pay the fire department $6,000 annually, and over the next four years, Metro Green will pay the department $36,000 annually.

Adorno’s total payments will be $120,000, while Metro Green will shell out $180,000.

William Ruskin, attorney for the department, said during the litigation it was revealed that neither defendant had insurance that would cover a monetary judgement against them. According to the court’s settlement document, Adorno’s insurance company, Farm Family, provided only defense coverage.

“There weren’t any deep pockets to recover the $1.4 million costs of remediation,” Ruskin explained. “We basically went into this not knowing what assets were covered by Adorno and Metro Green’s insurance. Before we found that out, the fire department, as plaintiffs, was prepared to go through with the entire litigation. We felt we were going to win the case.”

Ruskin added that depositions showed the department was unjustly accused of wrongdoing.

“The fire department was the victim here and was blameless,” he said.

According to Johnson, the department’s position throughout the legal proceedings was that the illegal dumping was carried out without the approval of anyone in authority at the department.

Court documents show that Adorno claimed that the plaintiff knew about the dumping of toxic material.

A 2016 DEC report based on an inspection of the dumping site stated that firefighter Charlie Milo had personally given Adorno permission to dump the fill. Milo is now deceased. The report stated that Adorno said, “some of the fill had come from a demolition site on Water Street in the Bronx and from Metro Green processing facility in Mount Vernon, NY.”

The report quoted Milo saying other trucks, not Adorno’s, had also been illegally dumping on the site for months. It includes Adorno stating that about 10,000 to 12,000 cubic yards of fill had been brought to the site over four months by his trucking company.

Ultimately, the DEC determined about 17,000 cubic years of hazardous materials was dumped at the site. The increased truck traffic prompted complaints by nearby homeowners.

A Jan. 2020 DEC Order of Consent stated that fire department officials acknowledged it had fill brought in to install a septic system for the new facility, and by doing so was unlawfully operating a solid waste management facility.

The list of contaminants in the Nov. 2022 DEC Closure Certification included semi-volatile organic compounds, seven metal compounds, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and pesticides. Construction and demolition debris included bricks, asphalt and concrete in a sand, silt and soil mixture.

The Consent Order called for the solid waste material to remain in place and be capped with a soil layer, allowing the contaminated fill to remain. Some in the community have questioned whether the contaminated fill is the primary cause of tainted water for nearby homeowners.

Adorno’s lawyer, Alita Giuda of Couch White, LLP, agreed the settlement was the best solution.

“It was truly a meeting of the minds,” she said. “All parties came to the table and decided to end the dispute and they were able to get across the finish line.”

The fire department’s statement about the settlement included claims that the DEC has been using a Site Monitoring Plan (SMP) to test the groundwater and that the SMP and any monitoring the DEC deems necessary will continue for many years.

However, Dana Ferine, assistant public information officer for DEC’s Region 3, asserted that “a continuous groundwater sampling is not part of the Site Management Plan for the Putnam Valley Fire Department landfill.”

Ferine added that “the DEC is considering additional investigative evaluations of the Putnam Valley Fire Department landfill to ensure the full protection of public health and the environment.” Ferine did not say when those evaluations would begin.

Construction of the new firehouse has been ongoing for the last three years. The cost of the new 29,000-square-foot state-of-the-art facility has been estimated at $11 million and is being paid for by a loan through a program that allows New York State fire departments to borrow money for up to 30 years with an interest rate under four percent.

It is uncertain when the project will be completed.

“We still need the big items to be addressed,” Johnson remarked about the firehouse construction. “There’s the pavement of the driveway and parking lots, the installation of an elevator, a water filtration system and floor tiling. There is an end in sight.”

Johnson said there are currently 65 active members in the department.