In the dumps

Part 3

by Kristen Lombardi

Officials may feel under siege as the coalition's campaign grows, but they're already feeling the weight of municipal pressures at the heart of the landfill debate. The DPW must find an existing landfill to deposit Worcester's street waste in three years when its current site on Ballard Street reaches full capacity. The Parks Department must convert Green Hill's landfill into safe recreational space, but it can't because of budget constraints. Finally, officials need to eventually cap the old Green Hill landfill in accordance with state standards.

Under the DPW plan, the city would start capping in three years, using street-sweepings and catch-basin materials, and finish in 12 years, thus sparing residents a 14-cent increase in the $1.64 sewer rate, Moylan says, because the city will save $1 million annually by dumping in Green Hill, rather than transporting waste out of Worcester. In return, three soccer fields, a basketball court, and a parking lot would be constructed at the dumpsite with the money saved.

Officials agreed to review the operation in six years to ensure the safety of the park land, but the offer hasn't appeased opponents. So, officials scaled back the plan this summer and proposed several versions: leaving the landfill uncapped, or implementing a 12-year, a six-year, or a three-year plan. A final option, capping the landfill immediately with toxin-free materials, was added as an amendment only after the coalition demanded it.

That coalition members consider the city plan asinine is enough to irritate some officials. Moylan says, "we're proposing to cap a landfill, not create a dump."

Street-sweepings and catch-basin materials must be deposited in a landfill, Moylan argues, and Green Hill's proposal mirrors the operation at the Ballard Street landfill. The project has proven successful, Moylan says, but space is running out.

"The city will have a problem once it exhausts the Ballard Street site," he says, adding the city has no other active landfills, except Green Hill, and he'll cutback hours of operation because of the park surroundings.

"All we're doing is using the same logic as we used in capping the Ballard Street site," Moylan says.

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On to Options at a glance

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Michael O'Brien, deputy commissioner for the Parks Department, says the city's doing more than replicating a good program. The plan provides the crucial funding needed to develop recreational facilities at Green Hill. Otherwise, he says, his department must find $2 million to cap the landfill with clean fill, and then convert the site to recreational space, which he estimates to be another $1 million in costs.

"I feel a desperate need to ensure a recreational component," says O'Brien, adding he isn't necessarily advocating the 12-year plan. But, he says, "the proposal has merit because it provides that component."

A number of councilors are now speaking out against the plans -- because street waste doesn't belong in a park. District One Councilor Stephen Patton, who heads the Youth, Parks and Recreation Subcommittee, has asked the administration for information before the full council debates the Green Hill landfill proposals; specifically, he's requested the administration find out if it needs special state legislation to implement such a plan in a park. (Councilors will debate the plan after the administration responds to citizen petitions.)

"The DPW proposal makes sense from a fiscal standpoint but to me a park doesn't mean a place to dump things," says Patton.

At-large Councilor Gary Rosen agrees, which explains why he's filed an order asking the administration to get local college students to investigate ways of capping the landfill without using street waste.

"You don't deposit these materials in a park," says Rosen, adding he's uncertain the administration's cost estimates are correct. "Green Hill was abused years ago, and I see no need to start abusing that park again."

On to part 4 Kristen Lombardi can be reached at klombardi[a]phx.com.