Special Board of Aldermen 03-15-2021 Page 5
property that’s “City Right of Way”; this is up along the Broad Street Parkway. This blue is the Fimbel Door
site and then just to the south of it you have the Mohawk Tannery, Site 1, Parcel 1 and the Mohawk
Tannery Parcel 2 or what is referred to as the southern site. Here’s the Nashua River along here. The
Fimbel Door is technically its own separate site and that’s just something folks should know from a context
perspective. It is its own separate site from an environmental remediation standpoint as it is a “capped
brown field”. And then this lower green area is actually the Mohawk Tannery. It gets a little confusing as
time goes on as | start to explain the project. Again, over here is the Turnpike. So | just want folks to have
that type of orientation as | begin to make my comments this evening.
lam going to stop sharing my screen and just the Memo | previously provided is just some good context; |
won't read that Memo but rather just add some additional details that hopefully will add some sufficient
background. So as the Mayor said previously, just a few moments ago, the site is known as the former
Mohawk Tannery Site also known as Granite State Leathers. It operated at the property between Fairmount
and Warsaw where it produced tan hides for leather between 1924 and 1984. The Mohawk Tannery Site
consists of two continuous parcels of approximately 15 acres each. The Tannery waste that was also part
of the disposal operation was mainly in the northern parcel not in the southern parcel of this site. Chester
Realty Trust is the current owner of the Mohawk Tannery Site. EPA and Chester Realty have a settlement
agreement for the site. It has been represented that the land area is under a Purchase & Sale Agreement
with the purchaser Blaylock Holdings, LLC. It is also my understanding the Blaylock Holdings, LLC. It is
also my understanding that Blaylock Holdings has a Purchase & Sale Agreement also executed to acquire
Fimbel Door from the current owner. Finally, Blaylock Holdings has expressed an interest in wanting to
acquire some of the right-of-way that abuts the Broad Street Parkway.
So | say that all to you to give you some context. Now | am going to talk a little bit about the environmental
situation at the site. The tannery produced sludge and acidic residue, much of which was disposed of in
two lagoons and other areas on the site. The sludge in the soils in the areas are contaminated with heavy
metals and semi-volatile organic compounds including among other substances Dioxins, 4-Methylphenol
Arsenic, Antimony, Cadmium, Manganese, Pentachlorophenol and Benzo(a)pyrene . Studies have also
shown that ACM is found in some of the areas in the surface and within the subsurface of the soil. EPA
and NH DES have been involved with many response activities at the Mohawk Tannery Site since in or
around about the summer of 1999. EPA and NH DES have provided that Blaylock has provided all the
available information relative to the existing contamination on the site and the adjacent properties. EPA
proposed the site for the National Priorities List in May of 2000 but it was never listed, it was withheld from
moving forward. The EPA performed an Engineering Evaluating Cost Analysis which was referred to as an
EE/CA in 2002 for the site. EPA completed an amendment to the 2002 EE/CA in 2018 at which time it
issued an Administrative Record for the EE/CA. The EPA then issued an Action Memorandum in
September of 2019 for removal to address the site for removal of the environment hazards.
EPA issued an Administrative Record on this in 2019 for that removal action. In September of 2019 the
Removal Action called for the removal of approximately 56,000 cubic yards of contaminated sludge, soil
and other hazardous material, easement and the removal calls for it to be consolidated and encapsulated in
an imperviable cap in and around the area of the Mohawk Tannery Site where approximately 68,150 cubic
yards of contaminated sludge overlaying soil is also present. Then the Blaylock has represented that they
would like to consolidate additional environmental hazards which was on the Fimbel Door Site and also the
environmental hazard that is in the right-of-way of the City, which is mainly asbestos, into this consolidated
cap site. My understanding is for this to occur, the EPA costed out the project to be somewhere between
$8 and $14 million dollars on their preferred alternative, which is, again, keeping the environmental hazards
on-site but encapsulated. My understanding is that through this public/private partnership that price could
be lowered. It has been represented that it could be represented significantly to something like $8 to $10
million dollars at which point the private developer would undertake this with assistance from the EPA and
the City of Nashua.
So the EPA recently updated their most recent public document on February 12, | believe that was the
Administrative Record that was produced previously in 2019. There was a public comment period which is
one of the reasons why | wanted to get this Memo to you, so you had the opportunity, if you so desired to
