By Stephen Tait
NEWBURYPORT — The saga of the embattled Crow Lane Landfill continues this week in a Boston courtroom, where Mayor John Moak says the future of the city-based dump is uncertain.
New Ventures, the landfill's owner, the state's Attorney General and the Department of Environmental Protection have a hearing slated for tomorrow in which a judge is expected to decide the direction of negotiations among the three parties, Moak said.
City officials said the three parties were waiting for the City Council to vote on a proposal made to the city by New Ventures that would allow the landfill to close by the year's end by bringing up to 75 dump trucks per day of material consisting partly of gypsum.
It was expected, city officials said, that New Ventures needed approval for the proposal from the city to finalize an agreement with the state.
But the City Council rejected that proposal in an unanimous vote last week. The decision stemmed partly from the testimony of at least a dozen neighbors who have been plagued by the smell of rotten eggs and burnt matches for almost a half decade — a smell produced by the decomposing gypsum previously dumped.
The councilors also rejected the deal since New Ventures did not provide enough incentive for Newburyport to accept it, officials said.
William Thibeault, New Ventures' president, said the decision by the council to reject the proposal limits the ability of the company to close the landfill by the year's end.
"It doesn't make much sense to me, but if that is what they want to do," he said.
Thibeault also said that the city is at least partly responsible for the waste at the landfill under DEP's 21E law, since it put heavy-metal sludge on the site in years past.
The DEP changed the classification of dump to a "21E" contaminated site rather than a solid waste landfill, which means there is a potential that all those entities that have dumped there must help pay for the closure costs.
New Ventures purchased the landfill in 2000 with the plan of closing the landfill; it makes money by dumping material at the site.
The company says that since the bulk of the trash came from Newburyporters, who used the land for years as the city's dump, a certain percentage of the cost should be paid by the city.
"...(T)here can be no doubt that the City has Chapter 21E liability for the Landfill," an attorney for New Ventures wrote to the city in a letter late last year. "It is well known that the City disposed of massive amounts of municipal waste and metals-laden sewer sludge at the Landfill."
As proof of liability, New Ventures produced Daily News articles from the 1980s in which city leaders voiced concerns about the disposal of the waste and a 1984 contract with the former landfill owner, Marcellos Disposal Company, Inc., that states the city "agrees to accept all responsibility for the trucking, handling and disposal of all sludge quantities," as required under state law.
The proposal from Thibeault and New Ventures, which was rejected by the council, would have cleared the city of some of the 21E liability.
Both Moak and Jack Morris, the city's health director, said negotiations will continue with New Ventures.
"I suspect there will be ongoing negotiations to try to get this thing resolved and get this closed," Morris said, adding that the council's vote last week "demonstrates the city's willingness to negotiate this and get this thing done."
Moak, who said Friday he had yet to hear from New Ventures officials, said the city will keep negotiations open.
"I wouldn't lock the door (to negotiations)," Moak said. "I want to make sure that we can keep all our negotiations options open."
Tomorrow's hearing
Moak said it is unclear how the Suffolk Superior Court judge may rule in the case.
"There are so many possibilities," the mayor said.
Moak said the judge could give the three parties an extension on negotiations. That could give the city more time to negotiate a better deal in regard to New Ventures' proposal, since an aspect of the council vote last week included stipulations that Moak and a city attorney continue to work on behalf of the city to reach a better deal.
But the mayor said the judge could go in any number of other directions, including forcing New Ventures to cap the landfill as it is now.
"It is a personal call," Moak said, before evoking a sports analogy: "Do you play Eddie House or do you play Sam Cassell? It is a personal choice that day."
The mayor did say, however, that the uncertainty of the decision is making him anxious.
"It does make me nervous," he said. "It makes me apprehensive. But I do think the City Council did the best vote they could have the other night. I thought the vote the other night was well thought out."
