Opinion ID: 852396
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The ELA is a Brownfields Claim New in 1998.

Text: The ELA is part of the Brownfield Revitalization Zone Tax Abatement  Environmental Revolving Loan Program bill, enacted in 1997 to become effective February 28, 1998. P.L. 59-1997, 1997 Ind. Acts 1789 (1997 Act). The bill's overall purpose was the rescue and redevelopment of brownfields, which the legislation defined as: an industrial or a commercial parcel of real estate: (1) that: (A) is abandoned or inactive; or (B) may not be operated at its appropriate use; and (2) on which expansion or redevelopment is complicated; because of the actual or perceived presence of a hazardous substance or petroleum released into the surface or subsurface soil or groundwater that poses a risk to human health and the environment. 1997 Act § 3. Section 23 of the 1997 Act did not amend any existing parts of the Code, but rather added to the Code an entirely new chapter (consisting of eight entirely new sections). See Ind.Code § 13-30-9-1, et seq. (the ELA Chapter). To be sure, the ELA chapter overlaps in some ways with enactments such as Indiana's Underground Storage Tank Act  Ind. Code § 13-23-13-8, the Petroleum Release statute  Ind. Code § 13-24-1-4(b), the catch-all environmental statute  Ind. Code § 13-30-1-1, [3] and the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA)  42 U.S.C. § 9601 et seq. (2009). Still, there are certain circumstances under which only the ELA would provide a cause of action. In addition to the ELA Chapter, the 1997 Act included several provisions adding to and amending the Indiana Code to further redevelopment. These provisions created certain tax abatements (§ 1 of the Act), supplemented an existing voluntary remediation plan scheme (§§ 17 through 22 of the Act), implemented a revolving loan fund program (§ 29 of the Act; Ind. Code § 13-19-5-2), and directed IDEM to develop procedures and a brownfield redevelopment work group (§§ 27-28 of the Act). This legislative effort to address brownfields included a set of policies and programs designed to encourage their remediation, partly by amending existing code and partly by adding new sections. The fact that a cause of action is embedded in a comprehensive bill that adds new material as well as amends existing statutes does not necessarily make it an amendment rather than the creation of a new cause of action. Section 6 of the 1997 Act defined what the legislature meant by Environmental Legal Action: ... any legal action brought to recover reasonable costs associated with a removal or remedial action involving a hazardous substance or petroleum released into the surface or subsurface soil or groundwater that poses a risk to human health and the environment. Ind.Code § 13-11-2-70.3. Cooper contends that this is a redundancy, that it merely restates all existing causes of action. Certainly there are claims available to plaintiffs apart from the ELA in cases similar to South Bend's, but together they do not exhaust the meaning given to an environmental legal action under the 1997 Act. For instance, South Bend points out that a proportionately small amount of its cleanup costs have been related to underground storage tanks or petroleum, so a correspondingly low portion of the recoverable costs would have been available under either the USTA or the petroleum release statute. Moreover, the City's remediation efforts have been voluntary, so as to exclude a contribution claim for compelled remedial action under contribution provisions of the USTA and CERCLA. In the course of considering the legislation at issue, the General Assembly made various changes to the bill as introduced that support South Bend's characterization of the ELA as creating a new action. For instance, legislators added a new § 1 to the ELA Chapter as introduced describing the general application, saying the ELA applies to actions brought by the state or a private person, but does not apply to certain actions brought by the state in more extreme environmental contamination cases: where the site is listed on the National Priorities List, scores at least 25 on Indiana's solid waste management scoring model, or is deemed by the IDEM commissioner to be an imminent threat to human health or the environment. 1997 Act § 23. In this context, we conclude the legislature contemplated ELA as creating a new cause of action. The legislature altered § 2 of the ELA Chapter to clarify the nature of the release of a hazardous substance or petroleum and to place a reasonableness standard on cost recovery. Id. It changed § 3 of the ELA Chapter to narrow one factor a court must consider in evaluating the environmental risks posed by the activity in question by weighing the use of the site at the time of the release against the cost effectiveness of addressing the risks imposed. Id. Furthermore, the General Assembly inserted language providing that a contract allocating responsibility between parties controls despite the ELA. Id. (this language appears in Ind.Code § 13-30-9-3(b)). Most useful on the question whether the ELA is a new cause of action is § 6 of the ELA Chapter, also added by the General Assembly to the bill as introduced. Section 6 states the same proposition in two clear ways. First, it provides that an action to recover costs related to a release from an underground storage tank may be brought under the ELA or the USTA. I.C. § 13-30-9-6. It then reiterates this concept: A person may not bring the action under both this chapter and IC XX-XX-XX-X, (the USTA). Id. Requiring litigants to choose between ELA and USTA (which unquestionably creates a cause) indicates the General Assembly clearly intended to create a new and separate cause of action. If the ELA was intended to clarify and narrow such claims as those under the USTA, there would be no reason to require a litigant to choose. Cooper also contends that the language the action means there can only be one action under both chapters of the code and that the action actually existed before the legislature enacted the ELA. (Appellant's Reply Br. at 6.) Again, reading the ELA in such a way would render the alternative ELA claim in underground storage tank cases meaningless. In fact, the definite article in the clause ... may bring the action under ... refers to the particular action in the previous clause: In an action to recover costs associated with a release from an underground storage tank.... Ind.Code § 13-30-9-6. This clause does not refer to an action brought under the USTA but to an action brought based on facts that would also produce a claim under the USTA. In so addressing this contingency, the General Assembly signaled it did not intend to grant claimants two bites at the apple. Two final changes made during the General Assembly's deliberations added sections to the ELA Chapter: (1) clarifying that a covenant not to sue under Ind.Code § 13-25-5-18 would exempt a party from suit as a result of the ELA and (2) excluding the ELA from affecting any litigation filed before its effective date. 1997 Act § 23 (enacting Ind.Code § 13-30-9-7 and -8). This provision about covenants not to sue as not being affected by the ELA Chapter further indicates legislative intent to create a new cause of action, for to read the ELA in any other way would not require such language, and, like § 6 of ELA, to read it as including existing claims would render it meaningless. Similarly, stating that the ELA may not be construed to affect any litigation filed before its effective date is in line with such an interpretation, particularly in light of a situation in which the ELA would provide a more favorable alternative action to a plaintiff after filing its suit.