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5 would not foreclose because of the possibility for tremendous liability due to contamination. He considered the only way to do a proper clean-up was to hire a professional company to remove the tanks, the pumps, and take care of the soil contamination, from an environmental standpoint. Then County workers probably ,courd remove the building safely. He predicted it would be a long time before the expense could be reclaimed or reimbursed, because nobody wants to claim ownership. Commissioner Eggert inquired about liability if we do nothing and someone got hurt, and Deputy County Attorney Will Collins advised there could be some liability because it could be considered an "attractive nuisance" and normally should be secured. He added that the real problem with this site "is the laws on environmental liability for cleaning up' hazardous waste. If the County undertakes clearing the site, there will be'the burden of proof that any environmental pollution was not as a result of the work done. Thus the County would be in a position of being responsible for not just cleaning up a discharge that may have taken place through the demolition of the building, but any contamination that had occurred in the past. Attorney Collins relayed that the Environmental Health Department had recommended first pumping out the tanks and removing them from the ground. At that point, we would have done whatever we could have done to not cause any further discharge before taking the building down. Public Works people think if we go in with heavy equipment, there would be some shifting or settling and there is no way we could ever prove that we were not responsible for some discharge if the tanks were still in the ground. It seemed to Attorney Collins they had two choices: 1) treat it as an attractive nuisance, board it up, and avoid the environmental liability altogether; or 2) have the tanks pumped out, removed, closed, and then take the building down. He predicted that if the building was taken down first, it would be like signing a blank.check for whatever the cost of clean-up of the entire site might be. It could be a quarter of a million dollars, there was no way to know. Another possible option is doing the work by hand, without heavy equipment, to assure nothing is disturbed underground. That might be expensive, however. Commissioner Adams thought boarding up the building would not solve the problem. Attorney Collins advised that the owner of the property is a dissolved corporation which had walked away from the property. He 38 June 20, 1995 M M