SC’s lawsuit against Jasper Co. trash pile owner likely headed for trial. What we know
More than two years after 31 Jasper County residents fled their homes near a towering mound of trash and debris spewing toxic smoke, a lawsuit against the trash pile’s owner is likely headed to trial.
Lawyers for the state of South Carolina and the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control, along with the lawyer representing Chandler Lloyd, owner of Able Contracting and Earlbee LLC, are asking a judge to schedule a non-jury trial, according to a motion filed in Jasper County court last month.
The move for a trial comes after both parties failed to reach agreement in mediation this summer on whether Lloyd and his companies are responsible for the more than $5 million it cost to clean up the trash pile site. Both sides are awaiting a judge’s order on the request for trial.
On Sept. 3, 2020, the state of South Carolina and DHEC sued Lloyd and his two companies, accusing them of accumulating over four acres of miscellaneous debris in a mound over 50 feet tall. The compacted material in the pile caught fire several times in the summer of 2019 and released “hazardous substances, pollutants and contaminants” into the environment, the lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit cites as authority the Solid Waste Policy and Management Act and the S.C. Hazardous Waste Management Act. It says DHEC removed 115,138 tons of material from the site by Jan. 6, 2020, and asked Lloyd and his companies to pay the state over $5 million in cleanup costs.
In a response filed last December, Elizabeth Partlow, the attorney representing Lloyd and his companies, blamed Jasper County for failing to respond to a “lightning-sparked fire” in mid-2019. That fire and actions by the state caused Able Contracting to go out of business, the response said.
Partlow also argued that the fire at Able Contracting did not present an “imminent and substantial danger to public health and welfare, human health, and the environment.”
The request for a non-jury trial says the case should be ready for trial April 25, 2022.
Robert Kittle, spokesperson for the S.C. Attorney General’s Office, declined to comment Friday, citing the pending litigation. Partlow, Lloyd’s attorney, also declined to comment.
The lawsuit against Lloyd and Able Contracting came after S.C. Sen. Tom Davis and members of the Jasper County legislative delegation called on S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson in October 2019 to pursue legal remedies to recover “all public funds expended” in fighting the fire and removing the material from the Able Contracting site.
Called Friday, Davis said the case was “playing out the way it ought to.
“I think it’s appropriate that [Wilson] bring this action and try to recover those funds if Able Contracting didn’t follow the [regulations],” he said. “And, by the same token, I think it’s fair that Able Contracting have an opportunity to explain its position and set forth why it doesn’t think there’s liability.”
Asked about Able Contracting’s claim that the fire did not pose an imminent danger to public health and the environment, Davis said “that’s just not true.”
“From both a human health standpoint and from an environmental standpoint, there was an imminent threat to public health,” he said. “At the time when the fire was being doused, I was down there on an almost-daily basis with DHEC and EPA officials, and they stated in no uncertain terms that there was a threat to public health, and there was a threat to the environment. That was readily apparent.”
At the moment, state taxpayers are still on the hook for the months-long environmental cleanup of the site by DHEC and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The lawsuit alleges that DHEC spent $240,000 from its Solid Waste Emergency Fund and an additional $5 million to clean up the site.
The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette first began reporting on the fire at Able Contracting in July 2019. The towering mound of miscellaneous debris, sometimes referred to as “trash mountain,” was spewing smoke and fumes over neighboring homes and businesses.
Residents and business owners in the rural industrial park along S.C. 170 complained they were getting sick and felt largely forgotten.
By early August, 31 residents of Schinger Avenue had evacuated. Soon after, the EPA assumed responsibility of the site and began cleanup efforts.
Over subsequent months, dump trucks and excavators hauled thousands of tons of debris away and carried it to nearby landfills.
In January, when DHEC announced that it had completed the cleanup of the site, officials said the state planned to seek reimbursement from “responsible parties” for the costs.
The fire at Able Contracting
At the end of Schinger Avenue off S.C. 170, just before the road behind Riverwalk Business Park takes a sharp left, the mound of trash and debris at Lloyd’s Able Contracting towered over 11 homes. It had been on fire, off and on, since June 2019.
The fires deep within the pile created waves of smoke that billowed over neighboring homes and businesses. The smell was acrid and unmistakable.
For months, residents in the area retreated indoors, closed windows and sought answers about the smoke that gave them headaches and made them feel sick.
In 2017, the Packet and the Gazette exposed a loophole in an outdated state law that allowed Able Contracting to accumulate material that at the time amounted to a 90-foot pile of debris.
Lloyd stored used construction materials there before recycling them.
In 2015, the pile caught fire, and firefighters spent 31 hours and used more than a million gallons of water to extinguish the flames.
Though state lawmakers enacted stricter permitting requirements for such facilities in 2018, the following spring, Able Contracting once again was battling a debris fire and subsequent hot spots.
DHEC set up air-quality monitoring stations in the area, finding particulate levels at more than twice the amount considered “hazardous.”
Hazardous chemicals, particularly acrolein, which is found in cigarette smoke, were detected at the site.
By early August, residents along Schinger Avenue were evacuated voluntarily — first by Jasper County and later by the EPA — to undisclosed locations, and the EPA began extinguishing the fire and hauling away debris.
In September, DHEC ordered Able Contracting to close, and by the end of the month — seven weeks after they fled — residents were able to return to their homes.
On Jan. 6, DHEC announced it had removed the final load of waste from the mound and was prepared to vacate the site.
Other legal problems
The state’s lawsuit is not the first time Lloyd and Able Contracting have faced legal problems related to the trash pile.
In 2018, Lloyd and co-defendant Hiram Lowther were charged with violating the Pollution Control Act and the S.C. Solid Waste Policy and Management Act between 2015 and 2016 under indictments handed down by a Jasper County grand jury.
Lloyd was released on a $20,000 personal recognizance bond in July 2019. There have been no public filings in the case since.
The indictments do not say whether the charges were related to the mound of construction and demolition debris at 472 Schinger Avenue.
Two other lawsuits — one in Allendale County and another in Jasper County — against Lloyd and other companies that allegedly contributed to the pile of construction and demolition debris are listed in court filings as dismissed. The lawsuits were filed on behalf of nearby property owners.
In addition, court filings show that at least two companies — CIT Bank and Financial Pacific Leasing Inc. — have filed claims over the past two years saying Lloyd and Able Contracting owe them money or property. Financial Pacific Leasing’s claim appears to have been dismissed, according to court documents.
This story was originally published October 11, 2021 at 4:35 AM.
