Opposing The Dump Stink.
A follow up on the local dump stink problem… a judge has ruled the state regulator dropped the ball.
The dump has gone ahead with expansion after being given a permit by the state to expand in an outrageous amount, even as people are suffering - even clear across the valley from this garbage dump site, whenever the wind blows from the east. I have adverse health issues when the wind blows it to my house, which is not usually because fortunately for me, the prevailing wind is from another direction. I can't imagine what it would be like to live downstream of the prevailing wind from this place. The property values must be in the toilet around that area, the only hope those people have is to sell their house to unsuspecting out of towners, or hermetically seal their houses, or suffer the adverse effects, and who knows what risks.
I’m often writing to my reps about this, and in 2023, I gave a public comment to PA DEP too.
And now I find in the news that a local advocacy group has brought legal challenge to it and a judge agreed.
DEP ordered to reevaluate permit for landfill in Lackawanna County WVIA | By Kat Bolus | WVIA News Published April 2, 2025 at 4:37 PM EDT Environmental advocacy groups formed in response to the plans to expand, including Friends of Lackawanna (FOL), who challenged the permit. Patrick Clark, from the nonprofit, said their concerns over leachate discharge and odor have been heard. The Sierra Club is listed as an intervenor. "The ruling validates what we've been saying for a very long time now that the DEP made a mistake in approving the Phase III permit, and the landfill is not being run as responsibly as it always claims it is," said Clark. Al Magnotta, a representative from Keystone, said their permit is still valid and they will continue to comply with leachate and odor management. "What the judge said, there's nothing wrong with issuing the permit, but it needs to be enhanced with additional operational controls, if you will,” he said. Clark said it's unclear what exactly will happen because of the ruling. "What the remand means is that the board has said to DEP 'you have to look at this permit and now take into account everything that you know about the landfill since you issued that permit, in addition to everything that is in this ruling,'” he said. Wastewater. A harms-benefits analysis was part of the permitting process. Erika Bloxham, a facility specialist in the Department’s waste management program in the Northeast region, was the primary author. Her conclusion is mentioned in Tuesday's ruling. She concluded that the benefits of the Phase III Expansion did not outweigh the harms "... primarily because in her opinion Keystone had not mitigated the excess leachate production to the fullest extent possible. However, Ms. Bloxham’s supervisor, Roger Bellas, the waste program manager for the Northeast region, disagreed and authored the conclusion of the analysis for the Department," the ruling states.
My first thought about this was that Robert Bellas needs to be investigated for conflicts of interest regarding the owners of the dump and their large family of business owners who own a great many businesses in the region, from healthcare to entertainment. There's a tendency for people to not want to "make waves" because the economy is very consolidated and monopolized, and the job market is never very good, so if you're from this area, chances are you have friends or family who work for every one of the big local employers. The state government should've known better and assigned this to people with no connections to this area – it's a big state, so why not?
The Times-Tribune, Scranton, Pa. Dunmore councilwoman raises landfill concerns to Shapiro, criticizes DEP Frank Lesnefsky, The Times-Tribune, Scranton, Pa. Thu, April 3, 2025 at 8:02 PM EDT A Dunmore councilwoman sent Gov. Josh Shapiro a letter Wednesday urging him to add stricter penalties to the Keystone Sanitary Landfill’s remanded Phase III expansion while also raising concerns over the role of a state Department of Environmental Protection supervisor who concluded the expansion’s benefits outweigh its harms. Dunmore council President Janet Brier, who emphasized she wrote the letter as a Dunmore citizen and not as a representative of council, sent Shapiro the letter in response to the Pennsylvania Environmental Hearing Board’s decision Tuesday to send the landfill’s 42.4-year Phase III expansion permit approval back to the DEP to potentially address issues with odors and leachate generation. As the culmination of a nearly 4-year-old legal battle brought by grassroots landfill opposition group Friends of Lackawanna, environmental judges ruled Tuesday that the department erred in issuing the Louis and Dominick DeNaples-owned landfill’s Phase III expansion permit in June 2021, which allows the landfill in Dunmore and Throop to triple its volume of waste through the 2060s by hauling in just over 94 million tons of additional garbage, or about 188 billion pounds. “The Environmental Hearing Board’s order confirms the DEP knew that KSL could not contain the leachate that it was already producing, yet they approved the permit for 94 million more tons of garbage to be dumped on our region,” Brier said in a phone interview Thursday. “One can only conclude that DEP is either grossly negligent or that political influence prevailed over science.” … (...) … Brier criticized Bellas’ role in her letter. “Throughout its existence, KSL has never been able to mitigate the excess leachate production for any length of time, yet the order remands the permit back to the very people who overrode the waste management facility specialist’s conclusion that the benefits do not outweigh the harms,” Brier wrote. “(Roger Bellas) still holds the position of Environmental Program Manager in the Waste Management Department in the Northeast Regional Office. I think it is fair to say that his mind is made up.” Brier contended Northeast Pennsylvania has been “subjected to malodors, insufficient leachate containment, methane flare offs, out-of-state truck traffic and indifference to all of this by the Department of Environmental Protection.” She said conditions have worsened at the landfill since its expansion approval, and the DEP’s response was inadequate.
I pity the people of Dunmore because they can’t possibly enjoy sitting on their porches or having a get together in the backyard with that awful smell. I know I wouldn’t be able to. I have to stay indoors when the wind blows it here or my eyes and nostrils burn and I get a headache. But I heard that some don’t complain because the dump pays to have their garbage collected for free. That wouldn’t be worth it to me. I pay $300 per year with the property taxes for refuse with the city of Scranton to collect the garbage and recycling multiple times a week. I find it hard to believe people really are happily selling their health and ability to use their own yard for $5.77 per week. I think it’s possible that people just feel hopeless, powerless, and stuck with their properties with no reasonable way to sell easily, so they take whatever’s given as a consolation. What a miserable community story if so.
I have no personal involvement in Friends of Lackawanna organization, but I’m disclosing here that I’m donating to this cause, because obviously I’m happy with their work. I don’t have a lot of money, so I can’t afford much, but I’m writing out the check for $25 today.
