“This is what I have to live with every day,” says Cindy Booth as she points to photos displayed on the wall to her right.
The snapshots, entered as exhibits at an environmental appeal board hearing, show flocks of seagulls and their deposits, as well as wind-blown litter and dust from a landfill near her home.
“I just want to live a normal life without the nuisance issues. This is not a place for people to be living around,” said Booth, who is also frustrated by the odor and noise from trucks delivering trash.
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She and four neighbors living near Ryley, Alta., are appealing a May 1998 Alberta Environment decision allowing Beaver Regional Waste Management Services Commission to expand its dump.
Fourth largest
The landfill, which is the fourth largest municipal dump in Alberta, receives about 200,000 tonnes of waste per year. An increase to 300,000 tonnes a year would put it in the top three. The landfill serves the region but much of its waste comes from Edmonton. A small amount comes from Vancouver.
“A walk or a picnic in the pasture isn’t what it used to be,” said Faye Garstad, who also lives adjacent to the landfill.
For the first time in years she won’t plant a vegetable garden because she’s afraid to water it from dugouts on her land. She misses the many species of birds that have been replaced by seagulls and magpies and says her mental anguish is “at times tremendous.”
Elston Solberg, chair of the commission and mayor of Ryley, said the landfill offers many benefits for the area. It employs up to 40 people, brings more commerce and handles garbage more responsibly than 10 years ago, he said. Commission consultants and officials from Canadian Waste Management, which operates the landfill, told the appeal board the dump is technically sound.
Landfill operators at the hearing apologized for the odor and wind-blown garbage, saying they would work to rectify those problems.
In Ryley, 80 to 90 percent of people are “very much in favor” of the landfill, said Solberg.
Pay to leave
Booth isn’t convinced that living 450 metres from the landfill is healthy and wants the commission to buy the family property so they can relocate.
She wants $250,000 for her property and the assets on it, an amount the commission refuses to pay.
According to commission administrator Forrest Wright, the committee offered the Booths $138,000. The commission has a policy to pay fair market value for the land, said Solberg.
Booth also wants provincial regulations, which state landfills must be at least 450 metres from a residence, updated to require more of a setback. The 450 metre requirement has been in place since 1936. That worries Booth, who feels waste is worse than in earlier decades and technology hasn’t kept pace.
“Man has to evolve to something better. If he can’t he has to keep people away from it.”
A decision on the appeal is pending. If the board approves the landfill expansion, construction should be complete by the end of the year, said Solberg, noting it’s already half finished.
