(Nathan E. Webster III photograph)
Although a parking garage has sat on the site since 2011, the city is still paying for environmental issues on the contaminated block.
Haverhill City Councilors Tuesday night are being asked to transfer $15,304 from reserves to an oil contamination account related to the 57 Granite St. garage. The money will be used to conduct air pollution monitoring within the garage and complete required cleanup reports.
“It was unfeasible, if not impossible, to fully remediate the site, given available funding and the time constraints of the expiring federal earmarks that funded garage construction,” said Andrew K. Herlihy, the city’s community development division director. In a letter to Mayor James J. Fiorentini, Herlihy explained it costs more than $1 million in state and federal money to clean the former Ted’s for Tires property. He said a final cleanup report is overdue to the state Department of Environmental Protection.
The 315-space garage is owned by the Merrimack Valley Regional Transit Authority, but built on city-owned land.