Officials from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) twice denied a request by two local legislators to appear at public meeting in New Hanover to answer questions about quarrying concerns before a permit is granted.

        State Rep. Marcy Toepel (R-147) and state Sen. Bob Mensch (R-24) want agency officials to answer questions in public about how a plume of volatile chemicals, in the vicinity of an 18-acre parcel located near the intersection of Layfield and Hoffmansville roads, would be disrupted if the Silvi Group is allowed to begin quarrying a 163-acre parcel in the area. The 18-acre parcel is adjacent to the contaminated site of the former Good Oil Company.

        According to Toepel, the meeting in the township is "a necessity" to examine the potential impacts of mining, which could disrupt the plume of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), damage the local watershed and poison private wells.

        "I believe this is a public safety issue," she said.

        The legislators have asked DEP officials not to issue a mining permit until those concerns are addressed.

        However, Toepel said the answers she and Mensch received to their requests were the same: the meetings are not part of the permit process, do not meet the agency's "mission critical" status and there is travel ban in place due to the Commonwealth's budget impasse.

        "All public hearings and other items required under regulations will be held," wrote Virginia Cain, a community relations coordinator with DEP's Southeast Regional Office, in an email Monday. But the requested meeting in New Hanover does not fall under those regulations.

        In December 2012, DEP officials discussed the plume during a public meeting prior to the installation of a water line to several homes with contaminated wells along Hoffmansville Road, according to Toepel.

        However, she said agency officials should be required to answer several outstanding questions presented by township officials and concerned residents – including Ross Snook, who has argued publicly that the site should be cleaned up and certified as nonhazardous before allowing blasting and mining near the toxins.

        The legislator recently met with Snook, a hydrologist and toxic site specialist who lives in the township. She described his evidence as compelling.

        "Now that the permit may be issued shortly, this is a new wrinkle that has not been addressed in previous meetings," Toepel said. "We need to know how the mining will affect the plume. ... Also, what does the DEP plan on doing to monitor or deal with it."

        Cain could not answer a question regarding the DEP's willingness to withhold a mining permit because those working closest on the issue were not in the office Monday, according to her email.

        Both state legislators will continue to advocate for their constituents "and have this matter properly addressed," according to a letter to the editor that recently ran in two daily newspapers and this issue of the Town and Country.

        According to Toepel, DEP officials offered to hold a meeting at their Norristown office with the state legislators and municipal officials. However, Mensch expressed frustration with the agency's unwillingness to allow officials to attend a meeting in New Hanover because of the travel ban. He called the policy "laughable and an insult to township residents."

        "DEP officials are traveling despite the ban," Mensch said Tuesday morning. "Recently, they attended meetings in Bucks County and at Cedar Crest College (in Allentown). This administration is acting more and more dictatorial and less and less cooperative."

        The senator also suggested that agency officials develop a plan to extend the water line to any property owners whose wells might become contaminated.

        The township's zoning hearing board will resume hearing Gibraltar Rock IV in January, following a request by the applicant's attorney, Stephen Harris, to cancel this month's meeting. The Silvi Group, a Bucks County concrete business, seeks a special exception to the municipality's zoning use regulation to quarry an 82-acre parcel north of Hoffmansville Road, including the area effected by the contaminate Good Oil site.

        DEP officials identified Ethan Good and three affiliated entities as the known responsible parties for the designation as a Hazardous Sites Cleanup Act site, according to information previously provided by Cain.

        Under the HSCA, DEP officials have filed cost recovery actions against Good and all of his affiliated companies. According to a separate email from the spokesperson, the DEP has filed an enforcement action under the Storage Tank and Spill Prevention Act, to require "characterization and remediation of the contamination on the site from regulated storage tank releases in accordance with the corrective action process set forth in DEP regulations."

        The message states that the agency is planning to conduct a "Source Area investigation to determine and delineate the source areas which contain the contaminants of concern at the site," and a "focused feasibility study aimed at decreasing the concentration of the contaminants of concern in groundwater."