MANSFIELD — Mansfield City Council voted Tuesday to “opt in” to pending financial settlements with companies whose products allegedly contaminated the soil at Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport.
Local lawmakers, meeting in special session, voted unanimously to remain among the communities around the country willing to discuss settlement offers from 3M, DuPont and others.
Council voted earlier this year to have the city represented by outside legal counsel in the lawsuit, including the Louisiana law firm of Cossich, Sumich, Parsiola & Taylor.
The lawsuit is being handled on a contingency basis, which means the outside law firms don’t get paid unless the city wins its lawsuit or achieves a settlement.
In agreeing to be represented by the outside attorneys, the city agreed to sign onto a federal class-action lawsuit against companies whose products allegedly contaminated the soil and water at Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport with toxic “forever chemicals.”
The complaint alleges products manufactured by the companies contained PFAS, including perfluorooctanoic acid (“PFOA”) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (“PFOS”).
These “forever chemicals” were discovered in the groundwater, surface water and soil at the former Ohio Air National Guard’s 179th Airlift Wing, based at the Mansfield airport.
The 179th had a flying mission for seven decades, a task that ended in 2022. The unit has recently transitioned into the Air National Guard’s first Cyberspace Wing.
When the city filed suit locally in January, it alleged 30 defendant companies “designed, manufactured, marketed, distributed and/or sold” products containing these chemicals dating back to the 1960s through today.
The complaint alleges these chemicals are found in products such as Teflon, Scotchguard, waterproofing compounds, stainproofing compounds, paper and cloth coatings, waxes and aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF).
“AFFF is a firefighting agent used to control and extinguish Class B fuel fires and is used at sites such as military bases, airports, petroleum refineries and fire-training centers,” according to the locally filed complaint.
“As a result of the use of (defendants’ products) for their intended purpose, PFAS have been detected in plaintiff’s property,” the complaint said.
According to a Reuters’ story published Nov. 13, some U.S. cities, towns and water districts have challenged proposed class action settlements worth more than $11 billion with 3M, DuPont and others, arguing the deals are too generous to the chemical companies.
Objections to the proposed settlement were filed earlier this month in federal court in Charleston, S.C., by 22 governments and agencies in New York, Texas, Colorado, California and elsewhere, according to the Reuters story.
Attorneys representing those communities said the settlements will not fully cover cleanup and legal costs facing water providers after the companies allegedly polluted drinking water with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.
Many of the objectors said the settlement terms were too broad and could inappropriately release the companies from too much future potential liability over PFAS pollution — including for remediation of soil or wastewater contamination, and from some personal injury claims.
“The funds proposed are grossly inadequate,” said the City of Dallas, Texas, asking the court to reject the settlements until fixes are made, according to the Reuters story.
Mansfield, however, is one of the plaintiffs willing to consider the companies’ offer.
“They want written documentation that the city is agreed to continue to participate in that settlement. The city’s not opting out,” Mansfield Law Director John Spon said after the meeting.
The veteran attorney, who leaves office at the end of December, said he doubted many communities would ultimately choose not to participate in settlement offers if the court allows them to go forward.
“The evidence that’s required to proceed with any litigation against the defendants is gathered specifically by the experts that they have hired. So it’s very expensive.
“So if a particular city wanted to proceed on their own, they’d have to hire their own experts, do their own tests. It would be tremendously expensive. So I seriously doubt there would be anybody that would opt out,” Spon said.
The legal battle will likely continue long after Spon’s third and final four-year term in office ends.
“It gets very complicated,” he said of federal class action lawsuits. “It could go on for years.”
In September, Spon told council that additional testing would be done on the soil at the airport. He said Tuesday he hadn’t heard anything new about that process.
