Company Fined $1 Million in Lead-Polluted Soil Case

A Temecula-based corporation pleaded guilty Wednesday to illegally disposing of lead-contaminated soil in Riverside County and agreed to pay more than $1 million in civil and criminal penalties.

The settlement with Ranpac Soils Inc. was announced by Riverside County Dist. Atty. Grover C. Trask II. The fine is the largest involving lead-contaminated soil in the state, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard T. Nixon.

Under terms of the settlement, Ranpac will be placed on 18 months’ probation, pay a $50,000 criminal fine, a $953,000 civil penalty, $97,000 in investigative costs, and contribute at least $100,000 to a nonprofit educational institution involved in environmental studies.

Nixon said the lead-ladened dirt could have been blown by wind onto nearby crops and inhaled by people and dairy cattle. Eventually it could have contaminated the local water table.

“You could imagine how that could enter the food chain,” Nixon said.

Lead poisoning is especially hazardous to children. It can impair their intelligence and learning potential.

Ranpac spokesman David Dillon said Wednesday that based on its own tests, the company believed that the soil was not hazardous and that the firm was in compliance with the law.

But, he added, “Continuing this thing was not in the best interest of the company and we settled (by pleading guilty). It was a difficult decision.”

In a separate but related action, Nixon on Wednesday charged Warren Sherling, the former manager of Ranpac, with five felony counts of illegally transporting, disposing and treating hazardous waste.

The contaminated soil was excavated in May, 1990, from Rainbow Canyon property owned by developer Won Yoo, who also owns Ranpac Soils. The site is a former county dump.

Nixon said at least 220 truck loads of contaminated soil were dumped at the Soboba Indian reservation in the San Jacinto Valley. After the county found the soil to be hazardous, Nixon said the firm assured officials that the remaining soil to be dumped was not hazardous.

The rest of the soil was taken to Riverside County’s Meade Valley landfill. But later testing by the county found that it exceeded the state lead concentration standard of 5 parts per million by as much as five times.

Actual levels may have been far higher, Nixon said. Concentrations of lime were found in the soil disposed at Meade Valley.

The dirt remains in the Meade Valley landfill and will be used by the county as a base for asphalt roads, Nixon said. The dirt at the Indian reservation will be paved over.