The Moretown Development Review Board voted Thursday night to postpone until May 2 its hearing of the Moretown Landfill’s application to expand into a fourth cell. The decision comes just before a looming deadline for the landfill to demonstrate to the state that it can control odors and in the midst of public outcry against the landfill’s current and proposed practices.
Moretown Landfill requested in a Dec. 3 letter to the Development Review Board that the hearing be postponed until Feb. 1, but the board decided to postpone until May because member Raymond Munn will be out of state until then. Munn has been filling in for board member Tom Badowski, who is general manager of the landfill, to avoid a conflict of interest.
The landfill asked for a continuance of the hearing so that it could, according to the letter, “focus all its immediate efforts and attention on its operations at the existing site.”
Brian Dunkiel, an attorney who represents the landfill, said that specifically means that landfill officials want to focus on reducing odors. There have been approximately 200 odor complaints in 15 months, some from as far as Middlesex, a mile away.
“The company takes these concerns very seriously,” said Dunkiel.
If the landfill cannot prove to the Agency of Natural Resources (ANR) that it can control off-site odors, it will likely be forced to close. That would leave Vermont with just one commercial lined landfill, though Secretary of ANR Deb Markowitz said landfills in neighboring states could fill the gap.
If the board had voted against postponing the hearing, Dunkiel said the landfill would have withdrawn its application to expand into cell four.
Neighbors of the landfill are concerned that the evidence they have presented to the board, including pictures of damage to their homes that they attribute to the landfill’s blasting, will become “stale” before the delayed hearing.
Board members expressed frustration with having invested substantial time and resources in the hearing, only to have it postponed.
“We’re very close to the end of that [application review] process,” said board chair John Riley.
Board member Eric Titrud asked Dunkiel to submit correspondence between the landfill and ANR regarding cells two and three. The landfill currently has applications under review by ANR for recertification in cell three and the reopening of cell two. Dunkiel refused to provide documents on those cells, saying it wasn’t relevant to the matter before the board; the board’s focus is the expansion into cell four.
As Dunkiel finished his argument, Martha Douglass handed copies of that letter to the board. Douglass is a neighbor of the landfill and spokesperson for Citizens for Landfill Environmental Accountability and Responsibility (CLEAR), an advocacy group formed by residents in opposition to the landfill’s expansion. The letter in question, dated Nov. 27, asked the landfill to “clearly and convincingly demonstrate” to ANR by Dec. 10 that it could control off-site odors.
The other document that Titrud requested from the landfill was a Nov. 20 Notice of Alleged Violation citing the landfill for 12 violations of solid waste regulations. Jim Dumont, an attorney representing Lisa Ransom and Scott Baughman, whose property abuts the landfill, said if the landfill did not provide that document to the board, he would. Dumont opposed postponing the hearing.
“This is a very unusual situation,” he said, referring to the fact that the landfill applied for a permit and then asked that the consideration of that application be postponed.
Titrud was the only board member of five to vote against postponing the hearing. He argued that if documents regarding cells two and three were not relevant to the cell four expansion, then the landfill’s need to focus on operations in those cells should not be relevant either.
The board also voted in favor of two conditions for the postponement of the hearing. First, that the landfill submit by April 1 any revisions to their proposed expansion plan. And second, that it submit any documents related to ANR’s actions regarding the landfill, including documents regarding cells two and three.
When asked whether the landfill would withdraw its application for an expansion given the long postponement, Dunkiel said, “I’m gonna have to consult with my client.”
Kalyn Rosenberg, of the Toxics Action Center, which supports the neighbors in their opposition to the landfill’s expansion, said she is “not sure what to make of this situation.”
Ransom said, “We just continue to be concerned about the health of our family, our business, our animals.” Ransom and her husband Scott Baughman own and operate Grow Compost on their property adjacent to the landfill.
Douglass said the board shouldn’t have granted the continuance and that it was “unfair.”
“It’s buying time so that anything we’ve said becomes invalid,” she said.