SWAMPSCOTT — The Select Board voted to extend Holcim-NER Inc.’s blasting permit until Sept. 20 on Monday night, providing the town and the excavation company roughly three months to resolve pending litigation against Swampscott.
Holcim, formerly known as Aggregate Industries, has conducted excavating operations at the quarry on the border between Swampscott and Salem for more than a century.
In November 2021, the company filed a complaint in U.S. District Court in Boston, claiming the town regulated and restricted Holcim’s business operations in order to take the site — physically and through regulation — after the town restricted its earth-removal permit.
The company alleges that the town’s permit, which limits the number of blasts each year to 50 and sets limitations on blast depths, would cost Holcim $34 million in lost revenue over the course of 19 years and render parts of the quarry operation useless.
The company’s current earth removal-permit was previously set to expire June 30. As a result, members of the Earth Removal Advisory Committee (ERAC) met with the Select Board and attorneys hired by Holcim to discuss issuance of a new blasting permit earlier this month.
“We have a number of parties here and we all need to work this out. Maybe there is a hope that we can find some kind of a settlement,” Town Administrator Sean Fitzgerald said June 7. “We’ve got to really sit down and study this.”
Select Board member Peter Spellios, at the June 7 meeting with Holcim’s legal counsel, maintained that he believed the town’s regulations were reasonable and necessary to maintain public safety and peace.
“We regulate more severely virtually every other business in town than we do this one,” Spellios said. “I continue to be troubled by the fact that we have only one business in town that regularly uses TNT and explosives… and we don’t see any accountability over decades.”
Out of concern that the permitting process might interfere with terms of a potential settlement, the board voted to postpone the permit hearing until June 26. In the meantime, the board discussed permitting regulations with Holcim’s legal counsel in executive session.
Select Board Chair David Grishman said Monday night that the town hopes to find a solution with Holcim’s legal team throughout the next three months.
“We will also be working with [Holcim’s] counsel to enter into some settlement negotiations so we can have those discussions,” Grishman said.
