The Burlington School District filed a lawsuit in federal court on Monday arguing that Monsanto should pay for the construction of a new high school.
The district alleges that the agrochemical giant, along with affiliated companies Solutia and Pharmacia, are responsible for contamination of the now-shuttered high school from polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Burlington, seeks compensation for the mitigation and removal of the PCBs, as well as the cost of building a new school, estimated at around $190 million.
“Today’s filing brings us one step closer to holding the producer of these toxic chemicals accountable for the harm it has inflicted on our community,” said Superintendent Tom Flanagan in a press release Monday afternoon.
The pharmaceutical company Bayer, which bought Monsanto in 2018, said in an emailed statement on Monday that the lawsuit “has no merit but hopefully it will shed light on the role of the state of Vermont, the Burlington School District and the manufacturers of the building products at issue in creating the perfect storm that resulted in unwarranted actions to abandon the school, move students to a converted Macy’s, cancel renovation plans and spend $165 million, more than twice the renovation cost, to build a new high school – actions that could have been avoided.”
Burlington voters recently approved borrowing up to $165 million to build a new high school at the Institute Road campus, where the former building has sat empty since the discovery of PCBs more than two years ago.
When the school district announced its plan to sue Monsanto in October, officials said they hoped to use money awarded from the lawsuit to pay down the bond.
PCBs are toxic and dangerous chemical compounds that were manufactured until 1977, according to the lawsuit.
“During that period, Monsanto was responsible for the manufacture of 99% or more of all PCBs used or sold within the United States,” the lawsuit states.
Common sources of contamination caused by PCBs include “caulking, glazing, sealants, and flooring adhesives,” according to the suit, which also notes that one of the high school buildings has “high levels” of PCBs in spray-on insulation.
In addition to airborne contamination from the original PCB materials, the lawsuit goes on to say that the chemical can “leach or migrate” into building materials such as wood, masonry or concrete.
The lawsuit describes the indoor air contamination from PCBs at Burlington High School as “significantly in excess of the relevant Vermont standards,” and details the presence of PCBs in construction materials and soil around the school.
The lawsuit goes on to allege that Monsanto “intentionally misled the public about the dangers posed by its PCB products”; that the company “knew PCBs were dangerous contaminants-even as it told its customers that PCBs were safe”; that it declined additional PCB analysis; and that it continued a “deception to protect its PCB franchise.”
The district claims that, had Monsanto “adequately warned the district prior to construction of the school buildings, the district would not have allowed the use of construction materials with PCBs in the construction process.”
It also makes the case that if the company “adequately warned the district in the period following the installation of these PCB-containing building materials, the district could have removed these materials sooner-which would have made it far less costly for the district to remediate the BHS/BTC buildings instead of replacing them,” referring to the high school and Burlington Technical Center.
Several former Burlington educators filed a separate suit against Monsanto in October, alleging that they have suffered from medical conditions caused by working inside the PCB-contaminated high school.
The district’s lawsuit was filed by attorneys from Burlington-based Langrock, Sperry and Wool and the national law firms, Seeger Weiss and Grant and Eisenhofer.