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So this was just an embarrassing mistake by some befuddled bureaucrat, right? Well...
The trouble started for McKnight in January 1996, when he rented out an old warehouse he owned to a man who claimed he would store janitorial supplies there. The renter filled the warehouse with hundreds of drums that, unknown to McKnight, contained toxic paint waste and other chemicals.
A year and a half later, an anonymous call came in to local officials, telling them about the barrels. McKnight's lawyer thinks the caller was someone who knew the tenant and hoped to get him in trouble. Neighbors apparently had no reason to complain: One woman who lived across the road said she smelled nothing, nor did a local code enforcement officer who got a brief glimpse of the barrels.
When EPA officials inspected the drums, they discovered that some of them were leaking. The chemicals, entirely contained within the warehouse, were no threat to ground water, but the EPA declared them to be hazardous waste and a fire hazard that had to be removed. No one relayed this to McKnight, however -- until EPA contractors showed up on his property one day in white moon suits. "They came in and started putting up chain-link fences and moved in a mobile trailer for their headquarters," he says.
McKnight's renter, who was prosecuted, couldn't pay for a cleanup, and McKnight says he was told by an EPA official that the federal Superfund program would pick up the tab. A couple of years later, the EPA had a different message for McKnight. He was now on the hook for costs that have reached $1.7 million. That comes to around $850 per barrel, or ten times as much as Mc-Knight says a private contractor indicated it would charge to whisk them away. The bottom line now for McKnight: He can't possibly pay his titanic bill, so he's fighting it in court.
McKnight's woes are an example of how well-intentioned environmental laws can go badly wrong, bringing unintended consequences that are as absurd as they are unfair. Make no mistake: Environmental laws have done a lot of good. They're the main reason our air and water quality have improved steadily over recent decades. But too often those rigid rules, enforced by rigid bureaucrats and zealots, wind up ruining lives.
Consider the case of a Michigan man named John Rapanos, who is in deep trouble for filling in less than 50 acres on his property that government agencies and an independent consultant had warned him were wetlands. Rapanos's argument was that the land was more than 10 miles from the nearest waterway and was dry -- hardly a "wetland," in his opinion. Sure, he was taking a risk developing the land, but his punishment was unbelievable: $185,000 in fines, three years' probation -- and now the government wants him jailed for ten months. A district judge was so shocked that he initially refused to sentence Rapanos to jail, noting that he'd just given a drug-dealing illegal immigrant only ten months behind bars. "If that isn't our system gone crazy, I don't know what is," the judge said. Rapanos's fate remains uncertain.
Then there's John and Josephine Bronczyk, a Minnesota brother and sister living on a family farm. Part of it was declared to be "wetlands" a few years ago because it abutted a lake. Confusing regulations threatened to make the Bronczyks' property open to the public. They had to fight in court for six years to get the state to acknowledge that their property was indeed private.
The list goes on, especially when it comes to rules protecting species. In the San Diego area, for instance, huge swaths of land have been made into sanctuaries for various endangered animals. As a result, both property owners and city officials were restricted from clearing underbrush, which built up and then exploded like kindling when wildfires hit in 2003. "I have no doubt the brush-clearing restrictions exacerbated the damage," says state senator Dennis Hollingsworth. In cases where people ignored the law and cleared brush, he says, "homes are still standing." The kicker is that all that buildup turned parts of sanctuaries into scorched earth.
Species protection has also had stupefying results in the Southern California city of Colton, where development has been stunted by the Delhi Sands flower-loving fly. When the county wanted to build a new hospital in the city in the early '90s, eight of these flies were counted on the proposed site. This forced a $4 million change in the construction plans -- or $500,000 per fly -- to preserve the inch-long insect's habitat. The city can't even use heavy machinery to clean up piles of trash alongside a stretch of road because the area has been deemed a fly habitat. That's right: They can't pick up trash as they normally do because it might disturb the flies.
If we're going to respect the good that comes from green laws, then the government needs to quit enforcing them at the expense of innocent people and businesses. To Paul McKnight's mind, it comes down to our basic values. A World War II veteran, McKnight says, "I just don't understand it. We fought for our country's freedom, but I don't think this is freedom -- the way they're treating me." So far, he's spent about $150,000 on legal fees. If he loses, he says, "I'd have to sell everything I own," including land that has been in his family since 1893. It's not too late for the feds to do the right thing: Tear up Paul McKnight's $1.7 million bill.
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