Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, October 7, 1994 TAG: 9410150018
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Fast implied that Boucher exempted sewage sludge from his recent interstate waste bill to aid WMX Technologies Inc., a national waste firm whose political-action committee has given Boucher $8,500 in the past four years. WMX Technologies has a subsidiary in the sludge business.
A Fast supporter and fellow Republican, Washington County Supervisor Maurice Parris, went further, accusing Boucher of "corruption" in a written statement released by Fast.
Reached at his Damascus home, Parris said he didn't write the statement, just signed it. Fast said later that campaign worker Matt Fender, a Virginia Tech student, wrote it after consulting with Parris.
"Corruption would simply mean that one is placing these special interests ahead of the interests of the people," Fast said. "I don't think that anyone means criminal corruption."
Boucher, a six-term Abingdon Democrat, flatly rejected the statements.
Boucher said Waste Management Inc., a WMX Technologies subsidiary, has been "my biggest headache" as he tries to pass the interstate waste bill.
"For my opponent to try to suggest that I have done favors for Waste Management on this legislation is absolutely inaccurate," Boucher said. "Campaign contributions do not in any way influence my acts with respect to legislation."
WMX Technologies spokesman Chuck McDermott said the company opposes Boucher's bill. "I don't believe anyone in my company ever had a conversation with the congressman about sludge, period," McDermott said.
The waste bill, the outgrowth of the Kim-Stan controversy in Alleghany County, would give local governments the final say on whether a private landfill could import out-of-state garbage. It passed the House last week, but its fate in the Senate remained uncertain Thursday.
Fast linked the issue to a Sept. 27 vote by the Washington County Board of Supervisors. The board defeated a special-use permit that would have allowed Bio-gro Systems to spread treated human waste on farmland to help alleviate Abingdon's lack of sludge storage space. Bio-gro is a division of a WMX Technologies affiliate.
Fast said local governments need the authority to stop out-of-state sludge from being dumped without their consent.
But Boucher and the chairman of the Washington County Board of Supervisors said local governments in Virginia already have that authority. Chairman J.T. Osborne, in a statement released by Boucher's office, said the waste act will help local governments regulate garbage and will in no way detract from their existing ability to regulate disposal of sludge. Osborne is a Democrat.
Boucher said the waste bill was never designed to cover anything but municipal garbage. Aside from sludge, it also doesn't cover construction debris, yard waste, highway asphalt and other types of waste.
"That begs the question," Fast said. "This is the whole question: When he had the opportunity to protect localities from the importation of out-of-state [garbage], why would he not want to apply the same measures to out-of-state sewage?"
Thursday marked the fourth time in five weeks that Fast has attacked Boucher on an issue; this was the first with a specifically local twist, however.
In each case - veterans' affairs, congressional reform, Social Security, and now sludge - Boucher said Fast was misrepresenting his work or views.
"Everything that he's said in the campaign is a cheap shot," Boucher said Thursday. "In this case, he simply doesn't understand the facts or the law."
by CNB