Bassett New Mexico LLC has received a U.S. Treasury check for $894,813 from the EPA for damages caused when the agency deposited thousands of tons of mining waste in a limestone quarry owned by the company. The EPA also withdrew its claim for the El Paso, Texas-based company to pay the government more than $6 million to cover the agency's clean-up activities.

This is the first case in which the U.S. Court of Federal Claims has awarded compensation to a property owner as a result of an EPA Superfund cleanup. The case arose out of a 1997 EPA effort to collect and dispose of more than 300,000 tons of mining waste at the Stephenson-Bennett Superfund site near Las Cruces, N.M. Although Bassett was not responsible for the generation of the past waste, the EPA claimed the right to permanently dispose of the waste in the limestone quarry owned by the company.

The EPA designated the quarry as part of the Superfund site and sought reimbursement from Bassett of over $6 million as the cost of the Superfund cleanup. Ultimately Bassett filed suit against the EPA. For more information, call Marzulla & Marzulla at (202) 822-6760.