Landfill tries for OK to reopen

A citizens group is mobilizing to oppose the granting of a permit.
By HAROLD GWIN
VINDICATOR SHARON BUREAU
GROVE CITY, Pa. -- Tri-County Landfill Inc. is trying again for a state permit to reopen a municipal waste landfill the state ordered closed 14 years ago.
The latest application appears to differ little from the one rejected by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection in 2001.
The biggest change is Tri-County's plan to bury what it refers to as "putresible waste" (garbage such as food that will rot) only at night to avoid attracting birds to the site.
Fears for planes
Birds and the proximity of the Grove City Airport just 1.3 miles away from the site were the primary reasons the state rejected Tri-County's applications to reopen the landfill in 2001 and 1997.
The state thought the landfill failed to adequately address the potential danger of bird strikes by aircraft using the airport.
The rejections came despite Tri-County's claim that there had never been any significant bird strikes by aircraft using the airport in the 15 years the landfill and airport were both operational.
The state shut down the landfill, located along the Pine/Liberty Township border, in 1990 because it couldn't meet new state regulations. Tri-County has been trying to win back a permit ever since.
The company has maintained a waste transfer station there since then, with garbage trucks hauling refuse to the site and other trucks hauling it to another landfill.
The latest application, submitted Aug. 23, claims that birds coming to the landfill are no threat to aircraft, but nevertheless offers a bird mitigation solution by proposing to bury putresible waste only from one hour after sunset until one hour before sunrise.
The material would be covered with a layer of soil before daylight so as not to attract birds.
Any garbage of that nature arriving at the landfill during daylight hours will be left in covered trailers and buried at night as well, the application says.
The landfill also has a state bird depredation permit that will allow it to kill birds such as gulls, crows, blackbirds, geese and other species if they present a problem.
The permit application has drawn the attention of an old adversary -- Citizens Environmental Association of the Slippery Rock Area.
Jane Cleary, a member of that group, said it is mobilizing to again challenge Tri-County's plans, just as it did for the 2001 application.
The group has numerous concerns, she said, referring to increased truck traffic, plans to treat liquid waste seeping out of the landfill and discharging it into Wolf Creek, and reports that the site will accept things like sewer sludge and demolition waste that could cause environmental problems, she said.
Also, there's a new housing development at the Grove City Country Club just a half-mile away and downwind from the landfill, Cleary said.
Concerns about wells
Cleary said there are concerns about residential wells in the landfill's general vicinity, noting that U.S. Environmental Protection Agency tests of 32 wells turned up elevated levels of toxins in 16 of them.
There has been no direct link between those toxins and the landfill, however, she added.
She also repeated earlier concerns that the Pennsylvania Department of Health has found higher-than-normal deaths from prostate cancer and non-Hodgkins lymphoma in both Liberty and Pine townships.
However, like the water-well contamination, there is no direct link shown to the landfill, she said.
Representatives of the country club and the nearby Prime Outlets factory shops complex have also told township officials that they oppose reopening the landfill.
Cleary said her group plans to attend public meetings to voice its concerns, raise money to launch a letter-writing campaign to elicit public support, and continue to talk to the state health department about the landfill's potential health hazards.
Economic benefits
Tri-County's application claims that reopening the landfill could pour about $100 million into the local economy over the facility's anticipated 10-year life span.
That includes wages and benefits for the 15 additional employees needed to run it, landfill construction costs and host disposal fees to Mercer County and the two townships.
It also would pour more than $40 million into state recycling, environmental stewardship and other environmental funds.
The plan, as was proposed in 1997, is to dig up the old 40-acre landfill, place that material on a synthetic liner and cap it to avoid any future environmental problems.
It calls for the creation of a new 30-acre disposal site that also will make use of a synthetic liner to prevent any contaminants from migrating from the landfill.
Methane gas escaping from the landfill would be captured and burned to produce electricity for the site.
Wetlands lost to the expansion would be replaced on a 2-to-1 ratio.
The landfill is on an old coal surface mining site and operated for 40 years before it was closed in 1990.
No review yet
The DEP hasn't begun an official review of the application yet and only recently started negotiations with Tri-County on a time line to complete that process.
There will be further public hearings and public comment periods before any decision is reached, a DEP spokeswoman said. The review process could take more than a year.