So, you may well have missed it because there wasn’t much in the way of public notification, but the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection had a “public commenting period” last month when it issued the Southbridge landfill a provisional permit to expand the yearly limit to 300,000 tons of trash per year. Mr. Clark mentioned it briefly at the December 19 Town Council meeting, but I believe that was the extent of the public’s notice.
I happened to randomly hear about this through the grapevine, but only because my large professional network of hooligans and troublemakers includes an environmental attorney that my loyal readers in Rutland, VT are not terribly fond of.
I poked around on the Mass DEP’s website and found a page for Public Hearings & Comments, but there was no information listed for that provisional permit for the 300,000 tons of trash per year coming into Southbridge. I started trying to email different folks at the DEP and eventually found my way to Lynne Welsh, the Central MA Section Chief of the Solid Waste Management Program.
Ms. Welsh and I ended up speaking on the phone, and she ended up clarifying a few things for me. The Mass DEP don’t publish any sort of public notification for a public comment period for this sort of permit; they leave it to the permit holder to notify the public. (She didn’t tell me on the phone how the permitee is specifically supposed to notify the public, just that it’s not something the DEP does on their end. She followed up with a more comprehensive email, though, which I’ll post in the comments.)
The other thing I was curious about is what the process is for how the Mass DEP receives comments from the public, and what the DEP does with the comments once they’re received. Ms. Welsh informed me that she was the person to whom people could submit comments. After the comments are received, she and the other staff members of the Solid Waste Management Program office will review them, and if they come across anything they feel merits any kind of action:
wait for it, this is good…
…they would refer the issue to the Southbridge Board of Health.
The folks in Sturbridge are going to be pissed when they find out that gem. Some backstory to describe the lay of the land: Sturbridge has an elected Board of Health, while the Board of Health in Southbridge is appointed by the Town Manager. Sturbridge voters seem to favor a Board of Health that takes a strong position on regulatory oversight, while according to many local folks here in Southbridge, our Town Manager seems to have gone out well of his way this year to fill the Southbridge Board of Health with folks who will take a light touch when it comes to regulatory oversight of the landfill, appointing a fourth and fifth member to the board in violation of our Town Charter (which specifies a three member board) and pushing for the council’s removal of a sitting member of the health board despite not actually having the legal authority to do so.
So yeah, of all of the places for the buck to stop, the Southbridge Board of Health does not inspire me with an overwhelming amount of confidence.
The Sturbridge Board of Health submitted five pages of comments to the DEP, and the Sturbridge Town Administrator submitted a three page letter as well. I was particularly interested in getting my hands on Mr. Suhoski’s memo after Councilor Marcucci brought it up for discussion during Councilor’s Forum at the Town Council meeting on Monday. During Mr. Clark’s response to the coucilor’s concerns, he said that Sturbridge Town Administrator Shaun Suhoski “hadn’t been around all that long” and “didn’t know what he was talking about.” I don’t know Mr. Suhoski personally, but them sounds an awful lot like fightin’ words.
Anyhow, here are the actual provisional permit documents that the DEP issued on December 9th:
Southbridge 39743 min mod WBCP 120911
Southbridge 39743 SRDP provSec61dec0911
Southbridge 39743 cvr vol inc WBCP prov 61 120911
Southbridge 39743 vol inc min mod 120911
Later this week: liquorboarding the art gallery, and two new first-time candidates who are collecting signatures for the Spring elections.
Good afternoon Ms. Peloquin,
I am responding to your email inquiry regarding the Southbridge LF provisional permit. I’ve attached the minor modification provisional permit and the provisional Section 61 Findings for your review.
The public involvement process for new or expanding solid waste facilities begins with the Mass Environmental Policy Act (MEPA). Public notice is required through publication in the MEPA Monitor http://www.env.state.ma.us/mepa/emonitor.aspx. This venue allows citizens to follow the progress and comment on new projects and also provides notice of project change. After MEPA completes its review, a local public process, including a public notice and public hearing, is held for site assignment and/or modifications of solid waste activities.
MassDEP will only consider permits when the preceding steps have been completed. The solid waste regulations, 310 CMR 19.00, require public comment notices for new solid waste facilities and facility expansions. MassDEP’s required notices are provided by the applicant in local papers and published by the local boards of health. The solid waste regulations provide an option for making minor permits provisional in order to allow for additional public comment. The Southbridge LF tonnage increase is a minor modification but because of earlier public interest, we made this permit, as we have earlier minor modifications permits, provisional, as well. I would check with the Southbridge Board of Health web site for agendas of their meetings and the local papers that cover Southbridge.
MassDEP also keeps lists of citizens who request to be notified of actions for particular facilities. If you would like, I can make sure you are e-cc’d on future actions for Southbridge LF. The MassDEP web link you provided is used for MassDEP draft policies and regulation development.
If you have questions or need clarification, please feel free to email or call me at 508 849-4007.
Regards,
Lynne Welsh
Acting Section Chief
Solid Waste Program
MassDEP-CERO
Ooh! Sorry Lynne, what you needed to do, as was well documented by the engineering firm we hired to evaluate the project prior to the extension agreement, was a "major modification" of the existing site. I won't get into how many other conditions the DEP has now violated but I will say, this is definitely going fed and with one phone call and one email there are already heads turning in D.C.
Also interesting how much required documentation has been omitted between the Town of Southbridge, MassDEP and the permit applicants throughout this process. It's as if a bunch of used car salesman drew up papers to build this thing, assuming they only were dealing with morons and no one was ever going to call them on their scam. When this one breaks, it's gonna hurt.
Un F'ing Believable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! so all of us who live downwind of the pollution factory don't get a voice as usual…..well…….only if they decide they will listen of course