K&W Metals, a recycling center situated at Goody behind Belfry High School, was the location of a major fire last year. The Belfry Volunteer Fire Department was assisted by 50 firefighters from nine departments to fight the blaze. Assistant State Fire Marshal Dave Broderick described it as one of the largest industrial fires he has witnessed in Eastern Kentucky.
The fire was eventually ruled accidental.
However, Kenny Pennypacker, owner of K&W, has been cited and fined by Pike County, the Department for Environmental Protection, the Division of Waste Management, the Division of Air Quality and the Division of Water for numerous infractions.
Doug Pauley lives on Compton Bottom Road. He has problems, he told fiscal court, with Pennypacker and how he manages K&W Metals.
“I have talked to (Pennypacker),” Pauley said. “I was very civil with him, but he has done nothing about this mess.”
Pauley said he has also been in communication with the various agencies which oversee this type of business, but so far, nothing has been done about the mess K&W is making of the area in and around Compton Bottom.
“I have talked to the DEP, and they say they are afraid to contact him,” Pauley explained. “They say if they are afraid if they do, he will skip the country without cleaning that up. They say if that happens, it would cost the state $1 million to clean it up.”
Mike Cline lives next to K&W, and he addressed the court as to his problems with the junkyard. He said his biggest issue is the noise created by the various mechanical operations performed by a salvage business.
“It sounds like bombs going off when he uses that big magnet to pick up (salvaged) cars.” Cline said. “He has property above his business to put his can crusher, but he put it next to my home. The spot where he load his trucks is 50 to 75 feet from my house.”
He went on to say he has contacted the Pike County Sheriff’s Department when K&W has been openly defying ordinances, but that Pennypacker always stops any alleged illegal procedures before the sheriff’s department arrives.
“I think he has somebody inside the sheriff’s department,” Cline said. “Because they always stop after I call the department, before a deputy can show up.”
Cline said his request that the fiscal court help him is his last resort.
“If this doesn’t work, I am going to give up my home and move,” he said.
Pauley told the Court he has a lawsuit on file to get Pennypacker to take responsibility for K&W, and he asked Judge-Executive Wayne T. Rutherford to help with that effort.
“Judge Rutherford, I really think if you could just call Frankfort, it would really get someone’s attention,” Pauley said.
Rutherford and Pike County Assistant Attorney Roland Case said the county would do what they could to help Pauley.
“What you need to remember is that this court is not an enforcement agency,” Case said. “We can pass ordinances against this kind of thing, but we cannot enforce them. You need to address this in circuit court.”
However, Case and Rutherford both said they would do what they could to help.
“We, as a court, can become a party to this lawsuit, if it pleases the court,” he said.
District Six Magistrate Chris Harris said he felt that was a good idea.
“People have nice homes in that neighborhood,” Harris said. “They take care of their property. To have this business move in and destroy the value of those homes, to drive down property values, its not right.”
Harris said he also hopes to be able to help the county pay for the money expended for putting out the huge fire at K&W last year.
“I would like to try and recover what the county spent on that fire,” Harris said.
Magistrate Hilman Dotson said he didn’t understand how K&W had avoided being forced to comply with EPA regulations.
“If a piece of county equipment drops oil anywhere, the EPA is on us,” Dotson said. “I don’t understand how they are getting away with not even trying to contain all this mess, there is oil and everything else running onto the ground.”
The motion to join the suit passed unanimously.
“I am not asking anything out of the ordinary,” Mike Cline said. “I just want the law enforced.
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