Says release could aid competitors
By Sarah Ovaska
The News & Observer
Copyright 2007 The News and Observer
RALEIGH, N.C. — The owners of an Apex hazardous material storage facility want to keep documents about how the company operates out of the public’s reach.
An attorney for Michigan-based EQ Industrial Services, Inc. asked Wake County Superior Court Judge Howard Manning Jr. on Monday to stop the N.C. Division of Waste Management from releasing information the company gave the regulatory agency.
The company, hired by businesses to take and dispose of hazardous materials, handed over the documents at the agency’s request after an Oct. 5 explosion and fire that resulted in the evacuation of thousands of Apex residents.
No one was injured in the overnight fire, but it immobilized the town for several days. People living near the downtown storage facility were awakened in the middle of the night and told to flee. Apex spent an estimated $200,000 fighting the blaze.
Manning did not immediately make a decision but ordered EQ to give the state agency redacted versions in the interim so that the public can access those pending his decision.
The documents in question were contained on three compact disks given to the waste management division, under the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources for an investigation into the fire. It includes customer identities, the amount and type of waste in the building as well as the plans for waste disposal.
The names of the estimated 13 businesses that used EQ to store waste at the Apex facility at the time of the fire as well as what they charged were included in the information handed to the state, said Richard Keshian, who represented EQ in Monday’s hearing.
“We’ll give a road map to the competition,” Keshian said. “It’s not information that the general public is entitled to.”
Attorneys for the state argued that all the information except for a customer list should be made public in line with state and federal regulations of the hazardous material industry. By releasing information about what was in the building, including forms developed by federal and state regulators, the state agency would only be showing the public a snapshot of how EQ operated on that day in October and not a rundown of the company’s entire economic model, said Jennie Hauser of the Attorney General’s Office.
“It would undermine public confidence in this whole system,” Hauser said.
Dexter Matthews, who heads the waste management division, decided in mid-January that the EQ-provided information should be made publicly available. A reporter for the News & Observer as well as attorneys representing plaintiffs in class-action lawsuit against EQ have requested the information from the state.
Last week, EQ received a temporary order from a judge preventing the release of documents pending Mannings’ decision. Manning must decide whether there are grounds to extend the order, or whether the documents should be released.
Generally, all documents in possession of public agencies in North Carolina are considered public record unless they fall under a narrow list of exceptions, such as trade secrets, said Hugh Stevens, a Raleigh attorney who attended Monday’s hearing on behalf of The News & Observer.