Royersford Borough files lawsuit against UniTech

"However, in 2003, the discharged waste water had findings of radioactive material, which included Cobalt 60, and was sourced to be from UniTech."

Phoenixville borough draws it's water from the Schuylkill River, as do many other municipalities downstream.

Might we all have been affected by the discharged radioactive materials?


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Royersford Borough files lawsuit against UniTech

Saturday, October 17, 2009

By AMY STRAUSS

astruass@phoenixvillenews.com

UniTech Services Group, Inc., a California Corporation authorized to do business in Pennsylvania and specifically located on North Third Street in Royersford, has been sued in Court by the borough of Royersford due to the discovery of radioactive contamination found in the borough's sewage system.

UniTech, the world's largest provider of radiological laundry and protective wear programs, was the first commercial nuclear decontamination laundry company licensed in the United States, and currently provides protective wear services for approximately 80% of commercial power reactors and Department of Energy nuclear facilities found nationwide.

Locally, the facility had been known to historically "discharge industrial process waste water into the sewer system of Royersford," although the waste water was affirmed to be "pretreated prior to the discharge, to ensure the removal of any radioactive contamination."

However, in 2003, the discharged waste water had findings of radioactive material, which included Cobalt 60, and was sourced to be from UniTech.

Without a rebuttal, UniTech paid for decontamination of Royersford sewage plant. Since the plant uses reed beds, a disposal technology that contains sludge within the facility's treatment, the remaining sludge after the decontamination processed by UniTech still contained contaminated material.

Due to the lethal pollution to the sewage plant, the borough ruled the sludge in the reed beds to be a "hazard and danger to the environment and Pennsylvania's public natural resources," which rightfully went against their position as a trustee of the public natural resources of The Commonwealth.

The costs incurred from the borough to remove the toxic wastes within the treatment plant resulted in a hefty fee for the Royersford, which in turn, caused them to issue allegations against the local business in hopes to receive the desired reimbursement.

Issued on June 16 and approved mid-August, the suit amounts at $357,905.62, with the additional promise to hopefully receive further amounts from pre-judgment interests and the costs of the litigation, as well as the attorney's fees.

The case is represented by Flamm, Boroff and Bacine, PC of Blue Bell, with the town solicitor Alan E. Boroff respectfully administrating the claims.

Boroff has reported that the UniTech has "failed and refused to compensate Royersford." However, as announced at Tuesday's borough hall meeting, the defendant had, in response, filed an additional legal document that stated that the borough's claims were partially incorrect in their original complaint document.

Attempting to successfully comply with Unitech's representative, Ken Kirkpatrick, Royersford adjusted the allegations that were in question and most recently, filed a revised version of the document.



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