Good morning Councillor Smith,
Could you please provide an update regarding the Waste Management Inc’s Highway 48 Landfill site?
I have been driving by this landfill site and have observed the flurry of trucking activity and the mounds of fill the trucks have been depositing at this location.
Are there any reports you can provide that detail the type of waste they are depositing? Do they do onsite testing of the fill prior to the trucks dumping? Who gets copies of these reports? What kind of fill are they putting there? How much fill and how much longer will this be happening?
Being a resident of Musselman’s Lake, am I able to get copies of reports as outlined in this document from 2013?
As you can imagine, I am concerned about what is happening at this location considering the history of the dump and the contamination that happened there previously. Also, it would be a environmental disaster if this company was filling up this location like the debacle that has happened at Greenbank Airport in Scugog township.
If you can please provide any update to ease my concerns, I would appreciate it.
A concerned citizen,
Regards,
DB
Dear DB
Thank you for your note and reminder. I am finally getting back to you. Sorry for the delay.
As you indicated this site has a long history. Of course you know it was a provincially regulated dump site during the years prior to many of us even moving here. As part of the closing of the site the current owners (Waste Management Inc) are obligated by the province to continue to monitor and provide regular inspections for their records. Including results from the ground water monitoring wells.
As this is a provincial regulated site the Region and Town have no say over what happens here. But that is not to say, even though it is not even in my Ward, that I do not have a keen interest in what happens at this location.
One of the obligations of the owner was also to not allow ponding of water over specific areas of the site. Over the years as the garbage deteriorates it shrinks causing the surface to collapse as well. When this happens the province enforce the owners to “top-up” the site. That basically what has been happening over the recent months.
It is our (the town’s) understanding that the dirt fill being imported onto the site is tested prior to it being trucked there. However, since the province does not have to inform town staff we are at a disadvantage in that area.
What I can suggest if you want to follow up further on the location is that you contact your provincial representative, MPP Paul Calandra. He does have a local constancy office in Stouffville phone 905 642 2588. Or downtown at 416 326 6664.
Regards
Maurice Smith
Councillor Ward 2