The Cost-Benefit Group, LLC News

Link: http://digitizedrevolution.wordpress.com/2008/06/28/larry-hertz-court-victory-hasnt-eased-water-concerns/

Kenneth Acks, CEO of the Cost-Benefit Group, LLC testified before a New York State Supreme Court in Dutchess County on June 5, 2008 regarding property value diminution arising from MTBE contamination.

State Supreme Judge Christine Sproat ordered the owners of a Gulf station in Fishkill to pay a Hopewell Junction family about $150,000 in damages for a gasoline spill that contaminated the family's water supply with a suspected cancer-causing chemical, a gasoline additive called methyl tertiary butyl ether, or MTBE.

Judge Sproat ruled the MTBE contamination diminished the value of the 6.5 acre property] by one-fourth of its assessed value - or about $140,000. The judge also ordered the Gulf station owner to reimburse the family for all of the bottled water purchased since 2001 - about $11,000. The Gulf station owner was also ordered to pay the Conklin-Stewart family's attorneys' fees.

Attorneys for the plaintiff questioned Mr. Acks, who included a powerpoint presentation describing the situation at the subject property, valuation techniques, and estimated diminution. He then faced cross examination from attorneys for the defendant, and a redirect.

The subject property consisted of a 6.59 acre site with 340.5 feet of frontage on Route 52 zoned R-1. The site is improved with a two-story two-family wood-frame home constructed circa 1790 containing 3,872 square feet; two one-bedroom, one bath wood cottages - one constructed 1930 containing 568 square feet the other constructed in 1830 containing 454 square feet with a 102 square foot finished attic; two small wood storage buildings containing 144 and 247 square feet constructed circa 1930; and a 576 square foot swimming pool installed circa 1930.

On or about June 19, 2000 a gasoline spill (NYS DEC Spill # 0004155) occurred at a nearby Gulf gasoline station located at Route 52 and Lake Drive approximately 200 yards west of the subject. According to that report 150 tons of contaminated soil was removed from the gas station site.

According to an October 2001 fact sheet from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYS DEC) the agency was working with the owner of the Gulf Service Station to address contamination since November 1999. As of September 2001, 124 water samples were collected from 32 private wells. The primary contaminant of concern was Methyl Tertiary Butyl Ether, or MTBE, a gasoline additive. Through October 2001 the migration of MTBE in groundwater was generally to the north of the station. Sample results showed eight wells with MTBE levels above 10 parts per billion (ppb) and 6 wells with MTBE less that 10 ppb. Beginning in October 2000, whole-house activated charcoal filter systems were installed in 8 homes and businesses with levels of MTBE at 10 ppb or higher and a tanker truck provided drinking water for businesses in the Archway Plaza on Route 52. On May 22, 2007 Conklin Services & Construction Inc. obtained water samples from the subject (19 Locust Lane)_which detected MTBE in the samples collected at the influent and middle of the treatment system at 18 and 24 μg/l. MTBE was not detected in the effluent. Prior samples reportedly registered MTBE readings of 77 parts per million with spiking occurring periodically. Conklin Services & Construction planned to change the carbon in the treatment system. This has not occurred and strong gasoline smells have been observed.

The defendant hired a local appraiser. The decision regarding diminution was within 5% of Mr. Acks' estimate, 20% higher than that of the defendant's expert.

Link: http://www.smarte.org

The Cost-Benefit Group has been invited to sign a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) by The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Research and Development (ORD) National Risk Management Research Laboratory (NRMRL) to enhance "SMARTE"

Under this CRADA, decision support tools related to sustainable land management will be researched and developed. Tools such as educational materials, documents, case studies, checklists, calculators, spreadsheets, databases and decision analysis tools will be developed and incorporated into SMARTe.

SMARTe (Sustainable Management Approaches and Revitalization Tools – electronic) is a freely available, open source, web-based, decision support system located at: smarte.org. SMARTe helps users overcome site revitalization obstacles by providing information, resources, links, and case studies for all aspects of revitalization including planning, environmental issues, social acceptance, and economic viability. SMARTe also contains analysis tools for evaluating specific aspects of revitalization such as analyzing site characterization data, performing risk assessments, selecting a developer, and converting units of measurement. Further, SMARTe is an integrated decision support system that allows revitalization stakeholders to objectively evaluate reuse options for specific sites and circumstances using a cost-benefit calculator. Revitalization stakeholders can use SMARTe to help them understand social, economic, and ecological trade-offs, present information to other stakeholders, and develop a revitalization plan.

According to AWSTATS, in 2007 Environmental Valuation & Cost-Benefit News, edited and published by Kenneth Acks of the Cost-Benefit Group, welcomed an average of 25,146 unique visitors per month. During the year these visitors paid a total of 574,740 visits and viewed 1,888,284 pages; 95,637 of the visitors felt that the site was worthy of a bookmark or addition to their list of favorite sites; and 71,069 spent at least 5 minutes on the site. The Hit Count was 5,707,446. The site has achieved top, top five or top fifteen Google Search status for such keywords as cost-benefit, environmental economics, cost-benefit analysis, and cost-benefit green buildings/brownfields/green roofs/environment/environmental, ...Among those linking to the site and its affiliated web portal www.costbenefitanalysis.org have been the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) National Center for Environmental Economics http://yosemite.epa.gov/ee/epa/eed.nsf/webpages/Publications.html and http://yosemite.epa.gov/ee/epalib/eelinks.nsf/e3539284c59a3f548525675a006180b6/59a36469b7f7ac39852568f3006f2acb!OpenDocument; the United National Development Program - Economics Toolkit http://www.undp.org/gef/05/documents/ld/Economics_toolkit_2edition.pdf; the The U.S. EPA’s Guidebook of Financial Tools http://www.epa.gov/efinpage/publications/GFT2008.pdf; Sustainable Development Online via EnviroWindows - the European Environment Agency Platform for Knowledge Sharing and Development, http://sd-online.ewindows.eu.org/Tools/URL_94/index_html?prettyprint=1; the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists http://www.aere.org/resources/research.html; Resources For the Future http://rfflibrary.wordpress.com/; the National Association of Business Economists http://www.nabe.com/publib/links/maclink.htm; the Australian Association of Resource and Environmental Economics http://www.aares.info/links; the Society for Risk Analysis http://sra.org/resources_nonprofit.php; the Kyoto University Graduate School of Economics http://www.econ.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~ueta/link.html; Indian Institute of Sciences; Wikipedia-Cost-benefit analysis; the American Economics Association’s Resources for Economists on the Internet; New Jersey Future; Environmental Economics Blog - Whitehead and Haab; Inomics; the Environmental Health & Safety (EH&S) Management Systems / ISO 14000 Center; Wikipedia-Contingent valuation; A Contract with the Earth; University of California at Santa Barbara Economic and Environmental Sciences Electronics Resources For all hyperlinks go to http://www.cost-benefit.com/LinksLinkers.htm

The subjects of this valuation consisted of 91 high-valued homes located within 4,000 feet of the Jacksonville Exxon Gasoline Station at 14258 Jarretsville Pike (MD 145). Over approximately 37 days in January and February 2006 approximately 26,000 gallons of gasoline from the station were discharged below ground representing one of the largest spills in a residential area in U.S. history.

Kenneth Acks, CEO was deposed for a second day by Exxon's lawyers regarding his estimate of property value diminution

The Cost-Benefit Group, LLC valued existing buildings and potential redevelopment of the A. Holly Patterson Gerriatric Center, which features an 889 bed 321,148 square foot nursing home (the largest in New York State) situated on 62.92+/- acres, or 2,740,795 square feet on three tax lots. Additional buildings raise the gross building area to 448,570 square feet.

The Cost-Benefit Group produced a 120 page valuation report of a 32-building Medical Center constructed between 1931 and 1974, with a total gross square footage of 1,780,665 square feet, featuring the 632-bed 19-story 1,088,265 square foot Dynamic Care Building situated on a plot with a total land area of approximately 51.597 acres, or 2,247,565 square feet.

The valuation report considered redevelopment possibilities.

On June 21, 2007 Kenneth Acks, CEO of the Cost-Benefit Group presented "A Framework for Analyzing the Costs and Benefits of Green Roofs: Second Stage Results” before the United States Society for Ecological Economics (USSEE) conference in New Yrk (see www.ussee.org/PDFs/Program_Book_June_21_2007.pdf)