Derby residents voted 389-243 on Tuesday to have the town continue opposing the Coventry landfill expansion.
The Vermont Agency of Natural Resources granted final approval last October to landfill owner Casella Waste Systems for the expansion, but the project still has to clear Act 250 review.
The Coventry landfill, which is permitted to accept up to 600,000 tons of waste a year, is the state’s last open landfill. The landfill takes about 70 percent of Vermont’s waste and also accepts some construction and other bulk wastes from out of state approved on a case-by-case basis.
The Derby Selectboard already sent a letter in January to the District 7 Environmental Commission expressing support for grassroots group D.U.M.P.’s opposition to the landfill expansion. Members of D.U.M.P. (Don’t Undermine Memphremagog’s Purity), feel that the state should have regional landfills and not one located near a large body of water that also serves as a drinking water source.
Effie Brown was one of the Derby residents who organized putting the measure on the ballot. She said opponents are doing “anything and everything that we can” to grab the attention of Montpelier lawmakers.
“It seems like they have what you might call willful blindness,” she said.
Selectboard Chair Gary Spates said the board had put the measure on the ballot because of the petition but didn’t feel the town would take further steps after the vote.
“Legally, I don’t think we’ve got much in the way to do,” he said.
Spates said although he had not voted on the matter, he feels the permit approval process is a good time for a broader discussion about long-term plans for waste disposal in Vermont.
“The state’s kind of painted themselves in the corner when you’ve got one active landfill in the state,” he said. “What are you going to do – say no?”
Christina Cotnoir, Derby resident, voted against the landfill expansion and has been active with D.U.M.P. She lives with her husband across from the landfill on the other side of the South Bay of Lake Memphremagog.
Cotnoir said she has called in to the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation to report odors from the landfill, including one time while canoeing with her husband on the lake.
“We were out there just taking a kayak and canoe and we’re like, what is that horrible odor? It doesn’t smell like manure,” she said. “My husband and I are in this beautiful, pristine setting, and all we can smell is the landfill.”
She is also concerned about the impact of the “mega-landfill” on local businesses and the region’s “greatest resource,” Lake Memphremagog.
“Really our biggest concern is that our small, impoverished rural area is being taken advantage of,” she said.
The expansion of the 78-acre landfill, which sits just west of the South Bay of Lake Memphremagog, has divided the leaders of the Orleans County towns that surround it. The Coventry selectboard sent a letter to the Act 250 commissioners in December expressing support of the expansion, while Barton sent a letter opposing it.
Michael Marcotte, chairman of the Coventry Selectboard and a state representative, said that he and other members of the board have been involved in discussions with Casella and the state about the landfill for decades and are confident it is not polluting.
Casella paid Coventry $1,147,506 last fiscal year for hosting the landfill, which provided 93 percent of the town’s revenue that year, according to the town’s annual report. Marcotte said that the state’s law stipulates the host community receive a tipping fee, adding that the fee did not sway the town to support for the landfill.
“They’re running a very good operation up there,” he said. “If we felt it was a danger to the environment and the people, we wouldn’t be supporting it.”
Meanwhile, the city of Newport had initially opposed the landfill expansion and refused to treat more landfill leachate this fall at their wastewater treatment plant. But in December, the city council voted to rescind their opposition and once again began treating leachate as they felt concerns about potential PFAS contamination and air quality had been addressed.
Seven Northeast Kingdom representatives sponsored a bill, H.98, this year that would require Secretary of Natural Resources Julie Moore to study the feasibility of siting another landfill elsewhere in the state.
Marcotte, the lead sponsor of the bill, said that the high costs of siting a landfill are too great a deterrent for a private business, so he feels a “public-private partnership” might be in order.
