The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation has announced a 45-day public comment period and two in-person sessions on the Dunn Landfill in Rensselaer.
Since the landfill opened in 2015 next to Rensselaer City schools, there have been persistent health and safety concerns. Neighbors have complained about bad odors, air pollution, and noisy truck traffic. Rensselaer Mayor Mike Stammel says calls to close the landfill are still being made.
"I'm still working to get the dump out of the city of Rensselaer," Stammel said. "It's great they provide money and services to the city. But it's something that's not only hurting our image, but I believe has a health element to it to for people that live here. So I'd like to see it close."
DEC's public comment sessions will be held at 2 and 6 p.m. on Tuesday, August 8th in the Rensselaer Junior/Senior High School auditorium. The comment period comes as the landfill’s state permits are up for renewal. Bob Welton with the Rensselaer Environmental Coaltion says he was told this will substitute for a second environmental justice hearing.
"We're still trying to completely understand the process, because there was a public, you know, the news release that they sent out," said Welton. "But there's also something called the Environmental Notice Bulletin, which gives this sort of technical details on how it works. So what they're doing, they call this an 'enhanced environmental justice review.' And it's something that we didn't expect, because they have an administrative law judge holding these two hearings on August 8th. But it's not clear. If she's making any decisions, or she's just a facilitator for the meeting. They have not, as far as I know, notified all the residents that would be affected like was done with the original environmental justice meeting that Dunn held, which kind of says, there's a lot of people who aren't going to know about this."
DEC Regional Director Tony Luisi says "DEC is committed to conducting a transparent permit review process that addresses both the state's and the local community's concerns about the Dunn landfill. We encourage anyone from the community who is interested to attend and participate at this hearing on August 8th in the auditorium of the Rensselaer city schools. DEC will fully consider all comments received before making any decision on these applications."
Welton says his organization has contacted DEC Commissioner Basil Seggos and other officials requesting further review of the process.
"The hearings will not be live streamed, there's no remote participation planned. And there will be no recordings of the meetings. So there is no opportunity to review what was said. So it's kind of like, kind of cloudy to us. We've called DEC, and asked for clarification, but I haven't gotten an answer yet," Welton said.
Written comments may be emailed to DEC or postmarked by 5 p.m. August 28th. The agency erred in a release disseminated by media outlets. The correct address for comments is Comment.DunnFacility@dec.ny.gov. Welton fears residents who already commented by email to the wrong address will not have their concerns heard.
S.A. Dunn did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
