The meager response from Albany city officials over odors from its landfill has led environmental advocates and Colonie residents to pool their resources to stop a proposed landfill expansion by hitting the city where its hurts.
It’s pocketbook.
Only a fraction of the nearly 300 people at a special meeting at the Village of Colonie’s Family Recreational Center on Wednesday, March 14, said they would pursue legal action.
However, most in attendance agreed that the town, village and Save the Pine Bush organization explore options to stop the stink emanating from the city’s Rapp Road landfill. The suit will seek to halt a proposed expansion into as many as 6 acres of pine barren lands, outside areas already protected.
Save the Pine Bush, the grassroots organization that has brought suits against developers and municipalities in the past threatening the ecologically rare pine barrens, led the meeting last week.
Environmental attorney Peter Henner, who is representing the organization if and when the suit moves forward, spoke with the audience about their options and if there is a case against Albany.
Living near the landfill or as far as the stink has reached complaints originated from people as far as seven miles east of the site is a quality of life issue, said Henner.
`It’s not that it (the landfill) is just expanding into a sensitive area. This is a landfill that is not run properly,` said Henner. `It’s not fun, to put it mildly, to live next to this landfill.`
According to Henner, residents’ reasons for concern should be their health and well-being and the financial impact to their property values because of the nauseating odors wafting over them.
Albany has been hit with thousands of dollars in fines from the state Department of Environmental Conservation for poor operations of its landfill.
Because no one has come in and put a stop to it, it’s time that residents take the city on, said Henner.
For years the village of Colonie, which shares its southern borders with Albany, and has been a fallout area for landfill odors, has been at odds with city and state environmental officials about getting something done. According to Save the Pine Bush, despite demands, the DEC has not come out to take air samples in the village and other hotbeds of citizen complaints.
The hundreds of people attending the meeting have opted to side with Save the Pine Bush to take action.
`I have written letters to Gov. (Eliot) Spitzer, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, and (Assemblyman) Bob Reilly asking for their help. We need help from the top down,` said village Mayor Frank Leak.
Communication with Albany usually stops at the `stink will go away,` Leak said. It’s time to get something moving that will remedy the situation, he added, to the applause of the audience.
The village does not contract with the city to dispose of its waste.
The village retained a law firm of its own to take on proposed expansions of the landfill that would take it into village lands. Now in its third proposal, the city’s second proposal in January 2006 was to take 60 acres of village lands and areas promised by the city to be added to the preserve. Although the city has rescinded the proposal to move onto village land, it’s most recent proposal borders the village, said Henry DeCottis assistant village attorney.
Because of the way the landfill currently operates, the village cannot stand and watch as the landfill increases in size toward its boundaries, DeCottis said.
Although only a handful of people at the meeting initially stated they would sign on for a suit against the city, expanding the landfill into sensitive areas closer to the village is something no one wants, said Sharon Rapp.
`It’s a dirty, nauseating, obnoxious odor. Sometimes its more like garbage, sometimes its more like gas,` said Rapp, 51. Her family once used some of the landfill property and neighboring areas for farming. The road is named after her family’s plot.
She has lived within a quarter-mile of the landfill off and on her throughout her residency in the outskirts of the city.
`The smell has never been as bad as it has been the last five years. The last three years have been the worse,` she said.
Rapp said she can barely stand the odor as she gardens. She will sign on to the suit to stop the expansion and odor.
The suit is not about the money; it is a last stand to try to do something, she said.
The `gas` odor Rapp spoke of has been the cause of many calls to village and town emergency crews. People suspect natural gas leaks, said Jack Ridick, chief of the village fire department. The response is as often as two to three times a month, he said. Each time, 25 to 30 men accompany National Grid employees and Colonie inspectors to survey the sites. Each trip can cost as much as $400 to $500 for his department, he added.
DeCottis and Leak informed residents that they would open discussions with the town of Colonie and Save the Pine Bush to explore the hiring of a private environmental firm to monitor the air in and around the landfill.
With such data and hundreds of complaints, those willing to sign on to take legal action against the city should have a chance in court, said Henner.
Henner will take compensation for his case only if the suit wins in the courts, he said. To assure their best chances in court, Henner said that Buffalo attorney Richard J. Lippes will sit in on the case.
Lippes is a high-profile environmental attorney who has represented plaintiffs in such cases as Love Canal and Three Mile Island.
`I’m hoping that village of Colonie residents will join us and sue the city of Albany. You should not have to live like this. You should not have to live with this stench,` said Save the Pine Bush volunteer Lynne Jackson.“
