ELR Citation: 42 ELR 20184
No(s). 10-C-910 (E.D. Wis. Aug 30, 2012) (Griesbach, J.)

A district court denied a group of companies' motion for summary judgment challenging the government's remedy for cleaning up PCB contamination in Wisconsin's Fox River. The companies argued that the administrative record is fatally incomplete due to the destruction of certain computer model data and programs that were instrumental in developing the remedy imposed. They assert that the absence of a complete model in the record precludes the government from demonstrating that the model is scientifically viable. But the fact that the administrative record does not allow complete replication of the results of one of the government's models does not, per se, mean a court is unable to determine from the rest of the record whether the government's action was arbitrary or capricious. Here, the government provided a 300-plus page report of 20 case studies from other dredging sites, and the record contains ample evidence explaining the government's methods and assumptions in developing the model and, more generally, the remedy. The record, therefore, sufficiently allows a reviewing court to determine if the remedy selected fails the arbitrary and capricious standard. The court also denied the companies' request to provide additional evidence to supplement the administrative record since it is not correlated to the problem the defendants have identified and would not remedy any gaps in the record that might exist.