Local conservationist has lasting impact in First State 

By Jayne Gest
Staff writer
jayne.gest@doverpost.com 

It was a case a little like David versus Goliath.

Ann Rydgren, past president of the Delaware Audubon Society, still remembers 4-foot, 11-inch Grace “Bubbles” Pierce-Beck sitting on one side of the courtroom with three figures in suits from the oil company sitting on the other.

She said she wishes she could paint the image she has in her head.

In the beginning of October, on the eve of yet another trial, the 20-year case by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and Delaware Audubon Society against the Texaco oil company finally ended with a settlement. The oil company had repeatedly violated water pollution limits and court orders at its Delaware City refinery.

The agreement requires Texaco Refining and Marketing Inc., and its successor Motiva, to fund $2.25 million in environmental benefit projects in the Delaware City area.

The case is just one example of how Pierce-Beck, a Dover resident, has had a huge impact on environmental issues in Delaware.

Grace’s involvement

Pierce-Beck said she was first involved in the environment when she served as a lobbyist.

She played an important part in the development of Delaware’s Coastal Zone Act. Then-Gov. Russell W. Peterson, who signed the act into law in 1971, called her the most effective environmental lobbyist in Dover. To this day, Peterson said he has great admiration for Pierce-Beck.

After the Coastal Zone Act was passed, Pierce-Beck would call Peterson when he was in New York or Washington and get him to return to Delaware to help protect it, he said.

Pierce-Beck also lobbied for the Wilderness Society in the mid-70s and worked on John Anderson’s 1980 presidential campaign as his national environmental director.

Rydgren said it was Pierce-Beck’s national reputation that led to the partnership between the NRDC and the Delaware Audubon Society for the Delaware City case, which was first filed in 1988.

In a nutshell, the Texaco plant had been discharging a higher amount of wastewater into the Delaware River than was allowed, said Mitch Bernard, litigation director at NRDC and lead lawyer for the case.

It was common knowledge and many groups had heard of what Texaco was doing in Delaware City, Pierce-Beck said.

“I think that because of people like Grace there was a lawsuit in the first place. Only citizens caused that accountability to happen, and Grace is chief among them,”  Bernard said.

The Delaware Audubon Society acted as the local organization in the case and Pierce-Beck, the society’s conservation chair, had to work to get support from other Delaware groups as well as find Audubon members to be witnesses who would testify they were affected personally by the pollution.

“People are leery,” Pierce-Beck said, “either they make up their mind they are going to do it or not.”

Rydgren said the opposition was really on their toes, trying to find any way to knock down the case, including going after technical things like whether a person was really an Audubon Society member.

Pierce-Beck said she remembers attending a meeting where many people spoke up for the company because it was their livelihood.

That’s something she understands, but “sometime in the future, it will come to my job survives or I survive,” she said.

A look at the case

Rydgren said the case had some element of individual risk because countersuits were popular at the time. As Audubon president she signed the initial legal documents, aware of the possibility they could come after her personally.

She remembers Pierce-Beck as almost shy, but as someone who wouldn’t back down. She said her piece, did her research, was very knowledgeable and wouldn’t let anyone get away with saying untrue things, Rydgren said.

What made the case unusual was how many times it went to trial with Pierce-Beck in attendance at them all.

Bernard said most civil cases are settled out of court, but the Texaco case went to trial three different times and was on the doorstep of a fourth when it was finally settled.

What wasn’t surprising is how long it took to reach an agreement. Rydgren said the Audubon Society is used to long-drawn out cases and sees them as ongoing projects.

The NRDC and Delaware Audubon won all three of the trials, the first in 1992 when a federal judge determined Texaco violated the Clean Water Act on 3,360 days and ordered the company to pay $1.5 million and to fully comply with pollution laws.

However, the case went back to court over the next 15 years to enforce the terms of the original court orders. It was during this time Texaco agreed to pay $361,000, which went to Delaware Wildlands and the Delaware Nature Society.

Bernard said the settlement really is the last chapter in an enormous amount of relief that was obtained, and he credits Delawareans like Pierce-Beck for their dedication and persistence.

That’s a commitment still evident today. Rydgren said although Pierce-Beck’s health keeps her from attending Audubon Society meetings, its members keep her informed and as a token of their esteem have voted her as conservation chair for life.

People like Pierce-Beck have helped make the Delaware Audubon’s reputation what it is today, Rydgren said.