Neighbors may savor the prospects of less noise, odor and possible health risks.

        Environmentalists may claim a symbolic victory in the name of environmental justice.

        But the surprise rejection by the Cincinnati Board of Health last week of a proposed waste transfer station in Winton Hills poses the risk of a lengthy legal fight for the city. It also raises questions about the future of trash collection throughout Greater Cincinnati — a multimillion-dollar business.

        “This is the first time we've seen anything like this in Ohio,” said Kathy Trent, director of government affairs for Waste Management of Ohio Inc., which seeks to operate the station. “We think (the health board) made a wrong decision, and we are hopeful that the decision will be reversed on appeal.”

        That appeals process could take several months, possibly years. It will be handled by the Environmental Review Appeals Commission, a little-known, three-member board in Columbus that reviews disputes over environmental permits.

        The commission has about 500 active cases. Some get settled in a month; others have dragged on for more than 10 years. Most involve several months of filings, informal conferences and formal hearings, said staff member Linda Adams.

        Ms. Adams said the commission does not regularly track how many appeals win or lose.

        Although well aware of the intense community opposition, Waste Management was still shocked by the health board ruling. The company had won so many previous approvals from state and local agencies that it spent more than $2.5 million to actually build the proposed transfer station.

        A modest, warehouse-like building on Este Avenue, it has 12-foot-tall beige concrete walls at its base and dark green metal siding. There's a weigh station with yellow guardrails and a trailer-like office, and a long driveway of recently poured concrete.

        For older cities where nearby landfill space is filling up, many say waste transfer stations represent the future of trash hauling.

        The idea: Trash collection trucks would dump loads on an upper level inside the building. Then the waste would be compacted and packed into bigger trucks — entering the station from below — for hauls to out-of-town landfills.

        The business would run 24-hour weekdays, then close at 3 p.m. Saturday and all day Sunday. The station is in a mostly industrial area, but trucks using the facility would pass apartments in Winton Terrace and some homes in Winton Place to gain access to Interstate 75.

        Before the vote, opponents pleaded with the board not to license the station, because of the potential health risks; the additional pollution it could bring; and a long history of conflict with Waste Management, which operated the now-closed ELDA landfill. After the vote, opponents were hopeful that the transfer station would be permanently kept from opening.

        “To me, the Board of Health made a correct decision, and was brave in doing so,” said Karen Arnett, a volunteer with Environmental Community Organization.

        Linda Briscoe, a longtime neighbor and frequent critic of the ELDA landfill, said the potential truck traffic increase would be unacceptable, especially if the station ever reached its full capacity.

        “It's bad enough now on Este Avenue. Imagine what 700 more trucks would do,” she said. “And it's not just the trucks. It's what's in them.”

        Waste Management was mystified by the Board of Health rejection because, essentially, the health board ruled that the nation's largest waste company was not competent to run the new station.

        Waste Management owns or operates 293 waste transfer stations in North America, along with 284 active landfills, 160 recycling plants and 16 waste-to-energy plants.

        Of those, at least four transfer stations and eight landfills are in Ohio. All of them won local approvals to operate in 2002, including a construction debris landfill in Cincinnati, Ms. Trent said.

        With its pollution control systems, the Cincinnati project represented the “state of the art” in waste transfer stations, Ms. Trent said. To the company, its competence is beyond question.

        However, environmental groups presented the health board with a list of regulatory violations and fines paid at other Waste Management facilities, including thousands of dollars in fines connected to Ohio facilities.

        Neighbors questioned how the company could be trusted to run a new facility when it stirred so many complaints running the nearby ELDA landfill.

        The company dismissed the allegations of a poor track record, arguing that any company as big as Waste Management would accumulate a list of violations.

        To Waste Management, the health board's vote reflected an attempt to block the transfer station after city attorneys had informed the health board that it could not use its preferred reason — that opening the station would violate the concept of environmental justice.

        Advocates of environmental justice say poor and often heavily minority neighborhoods that have suffered decades of pollution should not be expected to endure new pollution sources, even if old zoning laws allow the use.

        Cincinnati City Council has endorsed environmental justice as a policy. In fact, when the city was considering building its own transfer station for residential waste several years ago, officials specifically rejected Winton Hills as a potential site because of the other pollution there.

        However, Ohio law does not allow boards of health to consider environmental justice as a factor, city attorneys told the board.

        How this dispute turns out will have long-term implications for trash disposal in Greater Cincinnati.

        The station was expected to reduce expenses of directly hauling trash from pickup routes to landfills. In theory, the savings would translate into lower trash disposal fees for Waste Management customers.

        Most of Waste Management's customers are manufacturing plants and industrial sites, along with some office buildings, apartment complexes and other commercial customers. The company has no local residential service deals.

        Serving only current customers, the transfer facility would process about 250 tons of trash a day. But its “permit-to-install,” already granted by the Ohio EPA, allows it to process up to 1,500 tons a day.

        Big money is at stake in that capacity.

        For example, the city of Cincinnati spends more than $2 million a year in fees to dispose of its 420 tons a day of residential trash.

        The city pays fees that range from $21.50 to $29.50 a ton, said Karl Graham, solid waste manager for Cincinnati's Office of Environmental Management.

        Using those rates as a guide, Waste Management's transfer station could generate $11.7 million to $16.2 million a year if it runs at full capacity.

        Email tbonfield@enquirer.com
Tony Jones
       Linda Briscoe, a Winton Terrace community activist, keeps a close eye on Waste Management's facility.

Football standout indicted
Race gap evident in Ohio test scores
Community gates swing both ways
Council to vote on begging rule
Raid shuts down Bristol's Show Club
Commission to vote on financing plan
Funds needed to send body
High school critics evaluate productions
Judge declares mistrial in shooting deaths
Laskey denied parole yet again
Taking pity on puppies
Tristate A.M. Report
Waste vote may start long fight
BRONSON: English Woods
HOWARD: Some Good News
KORTE: City Hall
SMITH AMOS: Police cases
Culture wins out over law in Fairfield building plan
Lebanon school district rethinks plan for two schools on same site
Man admits corpse abuse, not murder
Suit over closed meetings settled
These walls do tell stories
Traffic jab hits a sore point
Ohio's rules on belting in kids face new push
Building will serve as training site
Campbell Co. studying parks
Failure to indict angers Howell
Kentucky News Briefs
Ky. pushes for Hyundai plant
River site under study
Thomas More College cuts 11 jobs