It was business as usual Thursday at a Winton Place landfill that Cincinnati City Council ordered shut down on Wednesday.

        Officials of Gray Road Fill and C&D Waste Services said they had not heard anything from the city and were unaware of any order to cease operations.

        “The only calls I'm getting are from customers asking if we're still open, and from employees' wives wanting to know why we didn't tell them their husbands were going to be laid off,” said Wendell Shelton, C&D vice president. “I guess I'll sit back and wait for the guy to show up and shut us down.”

        If the city acts, business owners said it would be unfair and unprecedented — forcing dozens of employees from their jobs and stopping work on what they call the largest contiguous industrial park in the city limits.

        But building officials said Thursday it is a matter of when, not if, and that the orders to cease operations were being drawn up.

        On Wednesday, council members said they wanted Gray Road Fill and C&D, which hauls debris there, to immediately cease operations. They said they were angry that building officials had ignored orders last year to limit the fill and address a bevy of complaints raised by residents living near it.

        Landfill owner Roy Schweitzer said that a city order will be met with legal action because city building inspectors long ago approved his plans.

        “I am shocked,” he said, adding that he is operating within the law and has all the required permits. “We haven't done anything wrong.”

        Assistant Building Inspector David Gecks said that's not true.

        “They have never submitted to us any concrete plans,” he said. “It's been some sort of nebulous idea.”

        He said the landfill is being illegally operated and officials there used “engineering changes” to increase the size of the landfill from a permitted 820,000 cubic yards to 3.3 million.

        Building officials knew about the increases months ago, but didn't report it to the City Council until Tuesday.

        That's when dozens of residents complained that despite a council mandate last year nothing had been done. In fact, they said the problems are worse than ever with more trash being dumped and trucks rumbling through their neighborhoods 24 hours a day.

        Council members, who have criticized the city administration's lack of oversight, have asked for a detailed report on how the problems went unreported for so long.

        Mr. Gecks offered no explanation Thursday. He said orders being drafted would demand immediate shutdowns of some operations and give time for others.

        The basis for shutting down the landfill was that the company did not apply and pay for an excavation permit in 1993. C&D waste services was being shut down because the trucks were used for solid waste disposal, which is not allowed at a construction and demolition waste landfill site.

        Mr. Shelton said the city never told him that. If shut down, he said he would relocate his business and stop leasing land from Gray Road Fill. He employs about 30 people at that location.

        Mr. Schweitzer said that if he is shut down, he will be looking at layoffs of about 15.

        He said the purpose of the landfill is to build a light industrial park. He said it would be one of the largest in the city and that the city has known about it for years. He said development of the site is about three years off.

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