The Adirondack Park Agency is conducting an enforcement investigation into activities at a former missile silo in the Essex County town of Lewis that is also seeking a permit to test Howitzer cannons on or near the property. The APA has moved that process to special adjudicatory hearings.
The Adirondack Explorer's environmental policy reporter Gwendolyn Craig spoke with WAMC's Pat Bradley about how she learned about the enforcement investigation into the other activities on the property.
There are several environmental groups that are parties to the adjudicatory hearing and one of them, Protect the Adirondacks, has been sort of looking at some of the existing activities going on at the Lewis missile silo site. It's a former missile silo, I should say. But there is activity going on there that Unconventional Concepts is working on. And Protect doesn't want an investigation necessarily of the howitzer testing. That's separate. It's not permitted yet and it's going through a hearing process right now and the hearing will help the APA board determine whether to issue that permit to allow for that howitzer testing. But Michael Hopmeier, who owns Unconventional Concepts, the company that's seeking to do the howitzer testing, has been operating and doing various activities. He's a private security consulting firm and he has been doing activities at the missile silo. What we know about it is somewhat little. He did get a permit from the agency a few years back for up to 14 tents and these are like large, I almost say circus-style tents, to do some drone work there. And we also know that he has some contracts with the Department of War. And what we also know is he's had military exercises he's been hosting.
The APA and Michael Hopmeier have refused to comment. How difficult did that make it for you to get information for this article?
It's been a challenge. We have the paper trail, so it's very helpful when things are in writing and that was the case here. The agency is very leery of discussing its enforcement issues, even when they're already finished. So, yeah, it has been a challenge to kind of get the information out about what the agency is doing and how it operates.
Well, Gwen, that kind of helps put into context a comment that you put in the article by Protect the Adirondacks’ attorney that he was surprised to read that there is an investigation. That caught my eye because it's like, well, wait a minute his group is the one that requested it.
Right. Because the agency declined to tell him in any way personally about the investigation, which maybe isn't as unusual if it's ongoing. What caught him off guard was the agency's response to his request for records that said none existed. So yeah, it's been a bit of a quandary.
Gwen, even though this investigation is separate from the howitzer testing request and adjudicatory hearing, it does seem to be intertwined. What are you finding as you write about this?
Well, with Protect we have Chris Amato, who's their council and conservation director. But Chris has a long history in state government, including at the DEC (New York State Department of Environmental Conservation) and at the APA, and so he's experienced many adjudicatory hearings before. And his point is there's a line in the APA regulations that say any enforcement matters dealing with the same sort of project need to be worked out before a permit can be issued. And the agencies in this letter that we cited in the article said they don't think that's the case. The other thing to Chris Amato's point is that if there are found to be violations of the agency's regulations or permit, you know, how can you trust someone to follow the law and follow a new permit? So, if the agency were to issue a permit for the howitzer testing, but has enforcement issues on another permit involving these tents, he's been pointing those things out and the agency obviously is just not commenting, and neither is Mr. Hopmeier to us at this time.
Do you think that this enforcement investigation would delay again the adjudicatory hearing on the howitzer testing request? I mean, it's been delayed what four times now?
Four or five times. Yes. I mean, there's staff attorney here saying that it will not delay and everybody should continue to plan for the October 28th start of the hearing. But there's lots of different things going on besides this. There's also Mr. Hopmeier has sued the APA and an individual board member over the vote to hold a hearing and we're still waiting on the state Supreme Court justice to issue a ruling on that. So, there's other things that could delay this again.
Gwendolyn Craig’s article “Lewis missile silo site under Adirondack Park Agency investigation, letter reveals” is on the Adirondack Explorer’s website.
