By JEREMY KOHLER
St. Louis Post-Dispatch (MO)
By J. Kohler
April 5, 2013
Missouri Auditor Tom Schweich says his office will audit the state agency assigned to protect the environment and public health from hazardous waste, after Post-Dispatch stories that exposed problems with oversight at the cleanup of the former Carondelet Coke site in St. Louis that has cost taxpayers millions of dollars.
Through a spokesman, Schweich said his audit team would examine what role the Hazardous Waste Program played in the problems identified in the newspaper?s stories last year. Two auditors will spend at least four months reviewing records, according to memos provided by the
program. The program pledged to assist them.
The Post-Dispatch investigation showed that another state agency, the Department of Economic Development, had committed $12.3 million to the cleanup with little public notice. Meanwhile, former owners Laclede Gas Co. and SGL Group were each paying just $471,250 and Carondelet Coke owner J. Donald Crane was paying nothing for the cleanup of what state officials said were 42 acres of the most polluted land in the state.
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