Last fall, Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne told a Wallace crowd he was so frustrated with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency plans to expand the Silver Valley cleanup he was thinking of asking EPA to leave the state.

It was political theater that the locals loved. They stood and cheered, and told the EPA to get out of town.

The fight over Superfund cleanup in this picturesque but economically devastated chunk of Idaho's Panhandle has been loud and long.

Anti-EPA signs dot the narrow valley. The EPA called in extra security to meetings last year after a local columnist suggested federal workers should be shot.

In a recent EPA survey, nearly three in five residents rated the agency poorly for gaining their trust. People blame the EPA for ruining their economy and exaggerating the contamination. The EPA, for its part, calls the cleanup "unusually contentious."

This battle stands as an anomaly in the Northwest, which has made heavy use of Superfund since Congress passed the landmark law in December 1980.

Washington state ranks sixth nationally in the number of Superfund projects, and Spokane County ties with King for the most listed sites in the state. They each have eight.

None of those cleanups has produced the depth of anger and distrust seen in the Silver Valley.

With the $253 million cleanup of the initial Bunker Hill Superfund site winding down, focus has shifted to EPA's plan to expand the work upstream to Mullan and Wallace and downstream to Spokane.

The expanded cleanup could take 30 years and cost another $359 million. Additional work after 30 years could raise the total price tag to $1.4 billion. A final plan is scheduled to be released Aug. 13 during a visit to the Silver Valley by EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman.

"The impact has been devastating," Kathy Zanetti said of the EPA cleanup so far. She's a beauty salon owner whose family has lived in Wallace since 1886. "The stigma consumes your community. We are opposed to any Superfund expansion," she said.

Since 1987, more than $906 million has been spent on Superfund cleanups at non-federal sites in Washington, Oregon, Alaska and Idaho, the EPA says.

Nearly three-quarters of that money -- $700 million -- has come from the private companies responsible for the pollution.

Of the remaining $206 million from the public's Superfund trust fund, a whopping 60 percent has gone to one site -- Bunker Hill in North Idaho.

"It's our biggest Superfund challenge, our dirtiest and most complex site," said Mike Gearheard, the EPA's regional Superfund director in Seattle.

Congress created Superfund in 1980 to clean up industrial messes, from the five-acre PCB spill in North Spokane to miles of radioactive groundwater under Hanford's leaking nuclear waste tanks.

Its motto is "the polluter pays," meaning corporations foot the bill for their own waste and pay taxes into a trust fund to cover sites where the responsible parties are bankrupt or defunct.

Superfund is popular with the public, national opinion polls show. But it's unpopular with some companies that say the program targets current firms for old messes caused by others.

EPA has powerful leverage over cleanups. If a company refuses to proceed, EPA can do the work itself and charge the company three times the cost.

Most of the 1,235 Superfund sites nationwide are being handled by private industry with EPA supervision. The EPA takes charge of only 3 in 10 cleanups. EPA assumed control in the Silver Valley when the biggest polluter, Gulf Resources, moved its assets overseas and went bankrupt in 1993.

But the mining industry has a far worse record than the industry average, paying for less than half of mine site cleanups nationwide.

"There are a lot of mining companies that are owned internationally. They tend to go bankrupt or get out of Superfund liability," said Kathryn Probst, author of a new report on Superfund by Resources for the Future that was commissioned by Congress.

The mining industry says Superfund isn't a good tool for mine cleanups.

"Superfund was designed for small sites in the chemical industry, not mining sites that occupy thousands of acres or even many square miles," said Laura Skaer of the Northwest Mining Association in Spokane. She thinks the public, not mining companies, should shoulder most of the cleanup cost.

These so-called mega sites like Bunker Hill cost an average $140 million -- more than 10 times the typical industrial site.

"There's an upswing in complex sites," Probst said. "Our report proves that Superfund cleanups are not faster, cheaper and better."

In fact, she said, the cleanups are taking longer and cost more because the easier cleanups are winding down and those that remain are so complicated.

Washington, the Northwest's most populous state, has the most Superfund sites with 48. There are six in Idaho, 11 in Oregon and 13 in Montana.

The Montana sites include the public health disaster in Libby, where hundreds of residents were sickened by exposure to tremolite asbestos from a former W.R. Grace vermiculite mine.

Spokane County's sites include groundwater problems at Fairchild Air Force Base, a cyanide plume at Kaiser's Mead smelter and defunct public landfills.

Kootenai County has one former site, a waste oil recycling center near Rathdrum that was abandoned in 1982. It was declared a Superfund site a year later, cleaned up by EPA and delisted in 1992.

While industry has sparred with regulators over Superfund costs and timetables, Washington state's cleanups have been far less contentious.

"There's not a stigma over Superfund here. EPA works with us. It's a trust thing," said Michael La Scuola of the Spokane County Regional Health District.

Washington has its own tough environmental cleanup law and EPA often asks the state to take the lead on cleanups. Washington's lead cleanup standard is four times stricter than that used at Bunker Hill.

"Our state laws are strong. EPA recognizes them as equivalent or more stringent than federal law. Idaho doesn't have anything equivalent," said Flora Goldstein, head of the Washington Department of Ecology's cleanup programs in Eastern Washington.

New cleanup called overkill

The Bunker Hill cleanup was born in scandal. In 1973, Gulf Resources decided to operate its Bunker Hill lead smelter at Kellogg without repairing a fire-damaged baghouse, which captures toxic emissions.

For six months, 25 to 30 tons of lead per square mile rained down on the town. Children got dizzy and developed stomach cramps. The fallout was so thick drivers used their headlights in daytime.

Public health investigators found some kids living closest to the smelter had the highest blood lead levels ever recorded in the United States, condemning some to retardation. Nearly 1,000 children were harmed.

A company memo disclosed that Gulf had made a cold-blooded calculation: It would be cheaper to pay off families of lead-damaged kids than to shut down the plant and forgo profits while lead prices were high.

Gulf later settled two lawsuits brought by the families of 38 lead-poisoned children for nearly $32 million.

Earl Bennett, a University of Idaho professor and Idaho's chief geologist, calls Gulf's conduct "a criminal act."

"Everyone else in the Silver Valley today is reaping what those bastards sowed," he said.

In 1983, the government said Bunker Hill was one of the most polluted corners of the nation. A 21-square-mile area of denuded hills, contaminated towns and tailings-clogged streams was named a Superfund cleanup site.

Now, the EPA's proposed expansion of the cleanup has ignited new tensions.

Many view the plan as overkill. Some cleanup is needed, they agree, but not hundreds of millions of dollars worth. They say the state of Idaho should run the cleanup, not the feds.

Idaho's congressional delegation is among the most vocal. In a recent newspaper opinion piece, they compared EPA to "a stranger arriving at your home uninvited" who stays for 30 years.

"Our citizens are not begging you to help us. They are asking you to leave," the Shoshone County commissioners said in a recent letter to EPA.

Mary Lou Reed, a former Democratic state legislator in Coeur d'Alene and an EPA supporter, says she stopped working on Superfund issues because of the level of vitriol.

"The rhetoric is enough to make me sick. I had to get out of it," Reed said. "It's hard to believe that folks in the Silver Valley have no gratitude for the cleanup that's already taken place."

Behind the scenes, however, Idaho and local health officials are working closely with EPA to try and finish the Bunker Hill cleanup and plan for expanded work in the Coeur d'Alene Basin. And the EPA says many local people are quietly supporting the work.

"The state has been interviewing people for yard cleanup work in the basin. The turndown rate has been negligible," said Chuck Moss, Idaho's Superfund point man in Boise. "But there's still a question about how clean is clean and how much work we should do."

EPA reneges on promise

Some of the EPA's problems are self-inflicted.

The agency originally pledged not to expand the Superfund project beyond the 21-square-mile Bunker Hill "box."

But when the Justice Department filed suit in 1996 against Silver Valley mining companies for natural resources damages in the Coeur d'Alene Basin, the EPA reneged on that promise.

On March 20, 1996, a few days before the government lawsuit was filed, a "Bunker Hill Heads Up" memo went out to EPA's regional staff in Seattle.

EPA said it would be "dragged into the suit anyway" and joining would protect its interest in any money or work resulting from the government's claim for over $1 billion in natural resource damages.

"EPA Region 10 has always been very reluctant to even consider expanding the Site beyond the 21 square mile box. . .," the memo said. "EPA has written letters to politicians, (mining companies) and others indicating that it does not intend to extend the boundaries."

EPA's reluctance to expand: "strong state and local concerns about the stigma associated with living within a Superfund site."

The Justice Department filed the lawsuit because of concerns about widespread contamination that hadn't been addressed, says Lois Schiffer, director of the agency's Natural Resources Division in the Clinton administration.

A federal judge is expected to rule on the lawsuit this year.

EPA's about-face still stirs anger in Idaho.

"You can't expect the few surviving mining companies to pay for the whole thing," said Chris Pfahl, Asarco's closed sites manager and the last Asarco employee in the Silver Valley. Asarco is the largest mining company involved in the cleanup.

"America as a whole benefited from mining," Pfahl said.

Part of the animosity is cultural, a veteran Idaho senator says.

Idaho traditionally has been friendly to mining and distrustful of federal government intervention, says former Idaho Sen. James McClure, 77, who serves on the board of Coeur d'Alene Mines.

"I don't like Superfund," said McClure, who left Congress in 1991 after 24 years and founded a Washington, D.C., firm that lobbies for mining interests.

"I don't believe it's moral to penalize current operations for past practices, particularly when the past practices were legal. That's supported by many Idahoans, and that's why opposition to Superfund is more virulent here."

Don Heikkila, a cattle rancher and editor of the Harrison Searchlight, says the region's economic slump fuels the anger.

"These small towns have lost their tax base. Houses sit abandoned. They are barely hanging on, and people are very upset," Heikkila said. "They depended on mining and suddenly it's not here. They think 'big government' has complicated their lives."

Idaho's hostility over Superfund isn't confined to Bunker Hill.

In 1992, EPA proposed adding the Triumph Mine, an old lead and silver mine near Sun Valley, to the Superfund list. But local residents and state politicians resisted, saying EPA exaggerated the risks posed by 60 acres of mine tailings.

Triumph residents posted six miles of "Keep Out EPA" signs. Kempthorne, an Idaho senator at the time, Sen. Larry Craig and Idaho Rep. Mike Crapo, now a U.S. senator, joined the anti-EPA fight.

"The greatest health risk in Triumph has been the human stress created by EPA," Triumph resident Donna Rose told Congress in 1995.

EPA dropped the proposed listing. In January 1995, the state of Idaho, Asarco and the Triumph Mineral Co. signed a cleanup agreement.

The cleanup is expected to cost up to $6 million. Most of the soil and yard work is done, but Asarco's financial problems have delayed plans to plug the mine's acid drainage.

In North Idaho, state officials worry about the financial impact of EPA's proposed cleanup expansion.

Under Superfund law, Idaho must pay 10 percent of the estimated cleanup costs -- a fee set at $12.3 million for the Bunker Hill site. Idaho also must eventually pay all costs to operate and maintain water treatment systems and monitor the site once the cleanup is done.

EPA gave Idaho a break on Bunker Hill, allowing credits against its Superfund tab for environmental remediation, including a project to remove mine tailings from streams outside the original Superfund site.

"None of our match has been in cash," Moss said. "I compliment EPA for allowing that to happen. It was a really good deal for Idaho."

But with the national Superfund account dwindling, Idaho can't count on a no-cash match for the proposed $359 million Superfund expansion.

Superfund pot running dry

With heavy lobbying, industry has pushed Congress to back off on the corporate taxes that sustained Superfund.

As a result, the fund has shrunk from $3.6 billion in 1995 to a scant $28 million projected for 2003. The pace of cleanups has slowed and the trust fund could be dry by next year unless Congress jump-starts it.

The Bush administration says it won't ask Congress to renew the corporate taxes -- forcing half the $1.5 billion annual cost of the program onto taxpayers. The administration wants the public to pay the full cost by 2004.

Politicians opposed to the Bush plan are fighting back. In June, Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Lincoln Chafee, R-Rhode Island, introduced a bill to require companies to continue to pay Superfund taxes.

The financial woes of several big mining companies add to the uncertainty.

Asarco has over $1 billion in cleanup obligations at 30 toxic waste cleanups in the United States, including two old smelters near Tacoma and Everett.

Asarco's parent company, Grupo Mexico of Mexico City, reported a $245 million loss for 2001 and $3.2 billion in debts, a third of it attributable to Asarco.

Asarco borrowed cash for much of the Bunker Hill cleanup, but has quit paying its remaining bills. So has Hecla, said Pfahl, who signs all Superfund checks for a coalition of companies paying about $41 million for yard cleanups at Bunker Hill.

The EPA recently ordered Asarco to start a $22 million cleanup of its defunct smelter near Tacoma -- or face fines of up to $27,500 a day. A state Department of Ecology order followed.

The Justice Department and Idaho's attorney general also are pressing Asarco for information on why the company is switching a lucrative Peruvian copper mine to another Grupo Mexico subsidiary.

Idaho believes the copper mine is "Asarco's most valuable asset," Idaho assistant attorney general Curt Fransen said in a federal court affidavit.

The transaction could "negatively impact" Asarco's ability to clean up Bunker Hill and the Triumph Mine, and settle the Justice Department lawsuit in the Coeur d'Alene Basin, Fransen's affidavit said.

Asarco is discussing the status of the Peruvian mine and its cleanup responsibilities with the Justice Department.

"We had to borrow cash for the (Bunker Hill) cleanup," Pfahl said. "At Asarco, we've done what we had to do, but now, there are far more demands on Asarco than cash."