Which businesses owe the most in pollution fines?

Some businesses were operating without a permit or spewing too many pollutants into the air.

Others were creating too much dust or sending a stench wafting into their neighborhoods.

And some kept getting into trouble, becoming repeat offenders of local regulations enforced by the Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District designed to make breathing easier for more than 1 million people living in the Louisville metro area.

In all, Louisville businesses and individuals paid more than $3.8 million in fines since 2003 to resolve violations of local air pollution rules, an analysis by The Courier-Journal found.

“Enforcement and compliance are very important,” said Carolyn Embry, a former Air Pollution Control Board member and clean-air advocate who works at the American Lung Association of Kentucky. “There is a direct impact on public health when companies don’t comply with clean-air laws and regulations.”

The agency is the city’s fine green line when it comes to getting Louisville to comply with federal health standards for air pollutants like lung-damaging ozone and microscopic particulates - and to make sure people or businesses don’t cause dust or odor nuisances.

In Louisville, it’s been a generation-to-generation struggle from the district's start 70 years ago as “the smoke commission.”

Louisville’s air quality now is nothing like it was then, when pollution was so thick it was measured with yardsticks in buckets.

But a continued manufacturing base and coal-fired electricity helped Jefferson County rank fourth in the nation for industrial toxic air pollution in 2014, up one ranking from the year before, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Last spring, the lung association gave Louisville another failing grade, ranking the city as the 28th most polluted for ozone. The EPA this fall tightened the nation's smog standard by nearly 7 percent, putting the Louisville area on the bubble for continued compliance.

The human cost

The lung association counts tens of thousands of Louisville area residents who suffer from asthma and other lung ailments.

One of them is 88-year-old Winnie Hepler, who has advocated for cleaner air for decades, and often finds it hard to breathe.

Pollution makes health care costs rise, something she said she knows first hand.

“I really think (the air district) should be very stringent, especially in the West End with so much industry. But really, it’s everywhere,” Hepler said of pollution, including along busy roadways.

Greater Louisville Inc., the metro chamber of commerce, counts numerous regulated businesses among its membership.

But the chamber “has not taken a position regarding the district’s enforcement program,” said GLI Vice President Sarah Davasher-Wisdom in a written statement.

Those are matters between the district and individual companies, the statement said.

The district used to make sure motor vehicles didn't pollute more than they were supposed to, but the Kentucky General Assembly forced an end to that program in 2003.

Fines up under Fischer

The newspaper’s analysis was based on records of all fines paid from 2003 through 2014. The large majority were paid by companies, but sometimes individuals were cited, typically for illegal burning.

Fines paid ranged from $35 from a Louisville couple that violated open burning rules to more than $1 million from a western Louisville pigment manufacturer.

The C-J has put that enforcement data on its website, allowing the public to check clean-air compliance of businesses and individuals in their neighborhoods. The newspaper obtained the data under the Kentucky Open Records law.

In its analysis, the C-J identified the most common violations, the companies that paid the most or were cited most frequently, total fines collected by year, and other metrics.

Faulty vapor controls on gas pumps were the most commonly cited problem, accounting for 193 of more than 900 enforcement records.

Then came violations of rules controlling dust or other particulates not from smoke stacks (124); open burning (121); construction or operating permit violations, or violations of asbestos removal rules (105); and odors (86).

The newspaper found that yearly totals for fines collected are up under the administration of Mayor Greg Fischer, boosted in part by nearly $1 million paid by Eckart America in 2011 and 2013.

The Jerry Abramson administration oversaw the air district from 2003 through 2010, the first eight years of Louisville’s merged city and county government. Previously, the air district was a county function.

During Mayor Abramson’s tenure, the district collected on average $244,371 per year. The median annual amount calculating the central tendency of yearly totals was $224,613 during Abramson’s two terms.

By comparison, Fischer’s average and median yearly collection of air fines was $465,079 and $428,432, according to the analysis.

The findings were not substantially changed when dollar amounts were adjusted for inflation.

Eckart paid the most of all companies over the 12 years, more than $1 million.

It was found in 2011 by the district to have at least 100 violations of its permits, including failing to install and operate required pollution control equipment. About one-third of its penalties were assessed to make up for money the district said the company saved by not following the rules.

“There was a real lack of attention,” said Matt King, who oversees compliance and enforcement for the air district.

Jim Craig, head of operations for at the plant, notes that it had no violations since those that led to the big fines and were first reported by the company to the district in 2010.

“The situation was absolutely unintentional but related to our misinterpretation of some of the requirements inside a complex series of permits which were issued over a span of fourteen years,” Craig said. “We cooperated fully and worked openly with the (air district) throughout the process.”

District shifts priorities

The newspaper’s analysis could not shed light on what affect Fischer’s reorganization of the air district, which began in 2013 and concluded last year, has had on enforcement and fines.

It’s too soon to show any change in yearly enforcement trends under a new team led by executive director Keith M. Talley Sr., whom Fischer put in charge of the agency in January 2014 despite little background in air quality.

Some clean-air advocates were alarmed by the shake-up and a modest downsizing of staff following state and federal audits that discovered a broken air-monitoring program.

“The mayor and Mr. Talley appear to be bringing down the house for having a few moths in the closets," said Sierra Club leader Wallace McMullen at the time. McMullen said he's still concerned about the changes.

Fischer defended his moves during the political flap, pledging to "continue to issue and enforce air pollution permits that meet all federal, state and local rules and regulations."

For his part, Talley said recently the district will continue to fully enforce all its regulations.

However, he told the city’s pollution board at its September meeting that staff will be spending less time on odor and dust enforcement, which have generated their fair share of headlines in recent years, prompted by citizen complaints and about a quarter of pollution incidents over the dozen years.

For example, western Louisville residents used video cameras to report repeated blowing dust from combustion wastes at the now-shut-down Cane Run coal-fired power plant. And Butchertown residents and district officials have for several years been at odds over odors with the JBS Swift pork plant on Story Avenue.

Talley said he believes staff can operate more efficiently in those areas, still enforcing them, but focusing first on districtwide cases where the agency can get the most clean-air benefits from the largest sources of emissions.

The records also show that some businesses just kept getting slapped with local air pollution violations.

That suggests district’s enforcement is falling short, said environmental engineer Sarah Lynn Cunningham.

“Something is not working when you have so many repeat violations,” said Cunningham, who has worked as a regulator.

Embry agreed.

“I would like to have the district take a look at the repeat offenders and determine whether their fines are sufficient to serve as a deterrent,” she said.

King said district staff follow EPA guidelines for establishing penalty amounts.

“We take these things very seriously,” he added, saying they do increase fines if companies have the same problems over and over but not necessarily if there is no negligence involved.

But fines assessed are typically only a fraction of the potential maximum penalty, which can climb as high as $10,000 per violation per day.

And in nearly all cases, the district seeks to reach a penalty agreement with the alleged violator, as opposed to going through a more confrontational, trial-like administration hearings process.

JBS sees more trust

The top repeat offenders include some gas station operators who must control vapors at their pumps and underground storage tanks; a paving company; a cement plant; LG&E; and the meatpacking plant that slaughters up to 10,000 hogs a day.

The JBS Swift plant in Butchertown landed at the top of the list of companies with the most pollution incidents that produced fines at 28. It shared that ranking with former gas station operator Bulk Petroleum Corp. and the CEMEX Kosmos Cement Co.

JBS was also a top-10 leader in total fines paid over the 12 years, ranking 10th with $114,450.

JBS leads in one other category, too.

It has the most unresolved, active enforcement cases in the city - 27 out of a total of 49, all of them for alleged failure to control slaughterhouse odors. Several violation notices date back as far as 2011, showing the wheels of air pollution justice can move very slowly.

Former air district executive director Lauren Anderson, who retired in 2013, described the lack of action and enforcement delays as unacceptable during a recent public hearing involving another JBS matter.

She said the district was ready to take the case to a hearing two years ago, shortly before she retired.

“The APCD keeps issuing notices of violation to Swift, but that is apparently all they can do,” Anderson said. “I don’t see any movement to resolve any of those.”

Tom Nord, air district spokesman, said he believes the two sides are getting closer to an agreement, and that going to a hearings process “could lock everybody in for a year or two.”

“Our intent is to minimize odors in that area,” King said. “We think we are still making progress in our discussions.”

For their part, JBS officials said the new leadership at the air district seems more willing to listen, as the company and its lawyers challenge the city’s definitions of stink.

“I feel like they were a very untrusting bunch before,” said JBS plant manager John Cliff.

He blamed some of the odor violations pinned on his plant on other facilities. And he said it’s hard to comply with odor regulations because they fall into a subjective “gray area.”

“I think the bar has been raised year over year over year, and the standards have gotten tougher for us,” he said. “That said, we keep looking for new technology for trying to make it better yet.”

The company has spent $10 million over the last 15 years on improvements, he said, adding that it’s now weighing a new scrubber system that will eliminate a chlorine odor.

Bulk Petroleum no longer owns gas stations in the area, said Nord. A request for comment from Bulk Petroleum, based in Wisconsin, was not returned.

“The cement industry is one of the most highly regulated industries in the nation,” said Sara Engdahl, CEMEX spokeswoman.

She said the Kosmos plant diligently works to be in full compliance.

“If an unexpected issue arises, we quickly work to safely and appropriately resolve it,” she said.

LG&E was also in the top-10 group of companies cited most frequently, as well as the top five for total fines paid over the 12 years.

Company officials previously complained about fairness regarding the district’s enforcement of dust and odor issues stemming from coal-ash management at its now closed Cane Run coal-fired power plant during a run of repeated alleged violations in recent years.

Company spokeswoman Natasha Collins was conciliatory in a written statement: “While we have not always agreed with the APCD, we do respect and welcome that role as we work to be a good environmental steward.”

The newspaper’s analysis found that it’s not unusual for cases to take two, three or four years to resolve.

A slow pace is good, King said.

“We allow for meetings and discussions,” he said. “You want to make sure you are right in your assessments.”

Reach reporter James Bruggers at (502) 582-4645 and at @jbruggers@courier-journal.com.

Fines collected by year by administration:

Mayor Jerry Abramson:

2003 $139,485

2004 $53,185

2005 $266,060

2006 $300,475

2007 $253,875

2008 $145,635

2009 $600,900

2010 $195,350

Total $1,954,965

Average $244,371

Median $224,613

Mayor Greg Fischer:

2011 $930,894

2012 $72,557

2013 $550,789

2014 $306,075

Total $1,860,315

Average $465,079

Median $428,432

Companies that have paid the most fines*:

Eckart America Corporation, $1,017,250

D.D. Williamson & Company Inc., $307,500

American Synthetic Rubber Company, LLC, $174,125

Louisville Gas & Electric Co., $149,250

Rohm and Haas (Dow), $142,500

Kosmos Cement Co. (Cemex), $130,500

BAE Systems, $126,750

Lubrizol, $123450

Akzo Nobel Resins, $116,695

Swift & Co. (JBS), $114,450

*2003-2014

Most frequent violation incidents*:

Bulk Petroleum Corp., 28

Swift & Company (JBS), 28

Kosmos Cement Co.(Cemex), 28

Mac's Convenience Stores, 26

Thornton Oil Inc., 25

Louisville Paving Company, Inc., 19

Louisville Gas & Electric Co., 15

Metropolitan Sewer District, 14

American Synthetic Rubber Company, 13

Speedway SuperAmerica, 12

*2003-2014



Most frequent violations*:

Faulty vapor controls on gas pumps, 193

Dust and particulates, 124.

Open burning, 121.

Construction or operating permit violations, or violations of asbestos removal rules,105.

Odors, 86.

*2003-2014