Friday, June 18, 1999
Garbage transfer station opposed
BY ERIN GIBSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Residents of Winton Hills called a proposed solid-waste transfer station in their neighborhood an economic and environmental injustice at a public hearing Thursday night.
“This is an unfair and discriminatory action against the poor,” said Mindy McPherson, 19, assistant director of the Winton Place Youth Council.
Miss McPherson was one of about two dozen residents who testified against the transfer station during the hourlong hearing at the Winton Hills Community Center in Winton Terrace. More than 55 people attended the hearing, organized by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA).
Residents also cited traffic, environmental and health concerns in calling on the OEPA to deny Waste Management of Ohio a final permit to build the transfer station. Waste Management owns the ELDA dump and has a draft permit to build the station.
Residents recently reached a $2 million settlement in a 10-year-old, dump-related lawsuit with Waste Management. If a final permit is issued, the company would build the station at Este Avenue and Center Hill Road, adjacent to the now-defunct ELDA dump.
A possible 200 garbage compactor trucks would pour their loads into larger trucks there daily. Up to 1,500 tons of waste could be transferred each day.
The draft permit says the transfer station could operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Mary Lou Bowling, who lives on Kings Run Drive, a main dump truck route in Winton Hills, said she already hears trucks roar past her home each morning, starting at 8:30.
Joe Friedel of Winton Place asked how another group — city and OEPA officials — could sleep at night, knowing this proposal was in the works while the neighborhood wrapped up a 10-year lawsuit against the same operating company.
No OEPA, city or Waste Management representatives spoke at the hearing.
“We are tired of being harassed,” said Ray Schomaker of Winton Place. “We want to get the landfill cleaned up so we can go on to another stage in our lives.”
For OEPA, the next stage is to consider residents' testimony and prepare a written response that addresses their questions and concerns, said Karen Bryant, OEPA hearing officer.
People who did not speak Thursday and want to add their testimony to OEPA records can do so through June 24 by mailing a letter to Ohio EPA, Division of Solid and Infectious Waste Management, Systems Management Unit, P.O. Box 1049, Columbus, OH 43216-1049.
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