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2 <br /> 1 Briggs and Morgan' s pitch was basically that the City needed to get into <br /> 2 the case so the City could find out what impact the clean up in New <br /> 3 Brighton and area-wide would have on St. Anthony. <br /> 4 *the Special Master was convinced by New Brighton' s arguments that <br /> 5 the City was going to have plenty of opportunity to get its <br /> 6 2 cents worth in because there would be a lot of public hearings <br /> 7 like the one the EPA is sponsoring where public input would be <br /> 8 sought; <br /> 9 *the Special master had agreed with this argument, saying "if the <br /> 10 Army and New Brighton come up with something really off-the-wall, <br /> 11 St. Anthony should be able to stop it somewhere down the road. " ; <br /> 12 *the attorneys had then argued that it would be better to let the <br /> 13 City into the suit now than to have to undo the damage later. <br /> 14 Mr. McDonald told Councilmember Marks he perceived the Special Master' s <br /> 15 decision had been a discretionary call rather than actual law. He said <br /> 16 the magistrate had realized that the City wanted more than to just <br /> 17 intervene in the suit, but also wanted to get involved in the settlement <br /> 18 negotiations. He had advised Mr. McDonald that he wouldn' t have been <br /> 19 allowed to talk during the proceedings and said, "I could let you in but <br /> 0 if they won' t let you talk, it won' t do any good because I can' t force <br /> 1 them to let you get involved in their settlement negotiations. " The <br /> 22 Master Judge also indicated that the other legal rationale against <br /> 23 letting St. Anthony in was because this was a "consent decree" and under <br /> 24 environmental law, the Federal Judge who eventually will have to approve <br /> 25 any agreement reached by New Brighton and the Army will call for public <br /> 26 comment and at least have one hearing at which the City would be able to <br /> 27 stand up and say what it has to say. <br /> 28 Mr. McDonald reported the room was filled with attorneys from the Army <br /> 29 and Federal Hoffman, etc. and after Master Short had made his ruling he <br /> 30 had called Mr. McDonald and New Brighton' s attorney, Bill Skallerud, <br /> 31 aside and told Mr. Skallerud, "I 've ruled against Mr. McDonald, but <br /> 32 can' t you tell him some of the things he needs to know, basically, are <br /> 33 you going to treat the water or are you going deep and how will that <br /> 34 effect the plume which comes down to St. Anthony?" <br /> 35 The New Brighton attorney' s response was to send the City a copy of the <br /> 36 two page letter which went to all New Brighton residents and only said <br /> 37 "the Army was proposing that New Brighton treat the groundwater. " When <br /> 38 that arrived, Mr. McDonald said he had responded with a letter to John <br /> 39 Drawz and Bill Skallerud requesting more technical information related <br /> 40 to the ten items developed by the Bruce Liesch people, which would give <br /> 41 the attorneys better knowledge on which to base their future actions to <br /> 42 help the City. A carbon copy of the letter had been sent to Special <br /> 0 <br /> 43 Master Short. <br />