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GUNNISON -- The scope of the settlement reached between Top Stop and the victims of the underground gasoline leak in Gunnison has become a bit clearer. The settlement was confidential, but through open records laws KSL News was able to find Gunnison City's share of the agreement.
While a settlement has been reached, ending the legal saga between victims of a massive gasoline leak and Top Stop, it's obvious it won't come close to covering all of the losses, damage and suffering the town has endured for the past three years.
According to the agreement, Gunnison City will get the property where the Top Stop disaster began, 19 replacement trees for Main Street and $10,000.
Individual property owners and businesses impacted by the 20,000-gallon leak, can't talk about the specifics of their settlements with Top Stop because of the confidentiality agreement. But a few have told KSL it was a comparable settlement to what the city received.
Sources tell us the settlement was accepted after considering the risk of never collecting anything if the victims won the lawsuit and Top Stop declared bankruptcy. Meanwhile, Top Stop continues to pay for the cleanup efforts and says the company has paid $2 million so far.
"Until they meet the cleanup standards we've set, they're on the hook for the cleanup," said Doug Hansen, manager with the Utah Department of Environmental Quality.
The environmental quality department is overseeing the cleanup. Officials there disagree with Top Stop's claim last week that all but 200 gallons of the leak are accounted for. They believe the cleanup effort will continue for several more years.
"Right now, 12,000 out of the 20,000-plus gallons of product that were released have been recovered; so there's still additional work to be done, and we're expecting them to do that," Hansen said.
KSL's calls to Top Stop's owners Thursday were not returned.
Last week, the company issued a statement which reads, in part: "The settlement and cleanup demonstrate what Wind River has said since it first learned of the leak, that we will do whatever is necessary to clean up the leak and will endeavor in good faith to resolve the claims of those impacted by the leak." [CLICK HERE to read the entire statement from Top Stop's parent company]
E-mail: spenrod@ksl.com
