ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, August 13, 1996 TAG: 9608130080
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
A man who planned to open a tire recycling plant in Roanoke pleaded no contest Monday to maintaining an illegal tire dump.
The charge against Glenn McCormick, owner of K&M Rubber Products Inc., was the result of the first criminal enforcement of the Virginia Waste Management Act of 1994, according to Roanoke Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Wanda DeWease.
Circuit Judge Diane Strickland took the charge under advisement, meaning it will be dismissed if McCormick successfully completes one year of probation. Strickland also ordered McCormick to pay $12,000 in restitution to the owners of a Cleveland Avenue warehouse he rented for the business.
About 70,000 tires were illegally stored inside and outside the building between December 1994 and July 1995, creating an environmental, health and fire hazard, DeWease said.
The tires accumulated after McCormick's business plan - to haul old tires from car dealerships and other businesses for a fee, recycle them, and sell them in bales as fill material for golf courses - never got off the ground.
"This was a business venture that didn't work out," said McCormick's attorney, Tony Anderson. McCormick has already spent $50,000 to have the tires removed, Anderson said.
McCormick had faced seven felony charges, but prosecutors agreed to drop the charges in return for his plea of no contest to one misdemeanor. At the time of a state police investigation into McCormick's business last summer, some of the tires were being stored for a Rocky Mount tire-shredding plant that burned to the ground.
LENGTH: Short : 38 linesby CNB