Borough looks to demolish collapsed ZipMart building

The Kenai Peninsula Borough plans to demolish a partially collapsed building in Sterling without being held liable for the contaminated ground it sits on.

On Wednesday, foam chunks of yellow insulation and fragments of plastic sat among the spring dandelions at the site of what was once a ZipMart, located behind Sterling Elementary School off Swanson River Road. A gaping hole where the building’s rear wall stood yawned widely to the west and wires dangled from broken boards.

It’s been more than 20 years since the business, a convenience store and gas station, was in operation, and, since its collapse earlier this year, is now at the top of the borough’s hit list. As first reported by KDLL in April, the borough has attributed the collapse to a lack of maintenance and this year’s heavy snowfall.

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The building has further deteriorated in the months since and the borough has hammered out an agreement with the State of Alaska that will allow borough crews to demolish and remove the building without assuming responsibility for the contaminated soil underneath. That agreement was approved by assembly members earlier this month.

The Sterling ZipMart site was first added to the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation’s Contaminated Sites Program in 1995, when owner and operator Whittier Properties, Inc. found low levels of fuel contamination in soil and groundwater while upgrading a fuel tank. Because there was no evidence of a major leak no further action was requested, according to the department.

After the Sterling ZipMart closed in 2000, however, a site investigation found fuel contamination in soil borings and groundwater-monitoring wells. In all, it is estimated that about 53,000 gallons of fuel were released into the ground, with fuel detected as far away as Lee Street. In all, the state estimates the total fuel “plume,” or spill area, is more than 3,000 feet long and 800 feet wide.

The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation took over the investigation and cleanup of the site in 2002 and, over the next three years, recovered more than 18,000 gallons of fuel from the area. An additional 774 tons of soil impacted by fuel were treated in 2009 and thousands of gallons of gas vapor have been recovered by soil vapor extraction systems.

A 2002 press release from the department says that six drinking water wells in the area thought to be most at risk from contamination associated with the ZipMart leak were not contaminated with fuel. Wells tested were at Sterling Elementary School, Sterling Baptist Church, Sterling Lutheran Church, Wash Out Laundromat, the ZipMart and a private residence.

More than two decades later, the future of the site is in the hands of the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly. Assembly members during their Tuesday meeting will decide whether or not to condemn the site and expedite the demolition process. The collapsed structure, borough staff say, poses new risks to the public.

The Kenai Peninsula Borough Planning Commission on Monday unanimously recommended condemnation of the building.

As part of that meeting, the group held a public hearing during which the ZipMart property owners had the chance to say why the site should not be condemned. None of the owners attended and Kenai Peninsula Borough Planning Director Robert Ruffner said the borough has not heard from them about the issue other than when the borough called to let them know the site was being considered for condemnation.

Ruffner told planning commissioners on Monday that, as part of demolition and removal, the borough does not plan to dig below the site’s cement slab.

“We’re not in charge of the contamination that is below ground — the fuel that spilled out of the fuel tanks — and we just want to make sure that we’re not in any way shape or form disturbing that any further than it already is,” he said.

More information about contamination at the ZipMark site can be found on the Department of Environmental Conservation’s site database at dec.alaska.gov/spar/csp/. Tuesday’s assembly meeting will be streamed live on the borough’s website at kpb.legistar.com.

Reach reporter Ashlyn O’Hara at ashlyn.ohara@peninsulaclarion.com.

Building materials pile up at the site of the former ZipMart on Wednesday, June 14, 2023, in Sterling, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)

Building materials pile up at the site of the former ZipMart on Wednesday, June 14, 2023 in Sterling, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)

Dandelions bloom around building materials piled at the site of the former ZipMart on Wednesday, June 14, 2023, in Sterling, Alaska. (Ashlyn O’Hara/Peninsula Clarion)