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[GreenYes] PRESS RELEASE: WMI Attempt to Recapture Yard Trimmings for Its Landfills Defeated in Peoria, Ill.
- Subject: [GreenYes] PRESS RELEASE: WMI Attempt to Recapture Yard Trimmings for Its Landfills Defeated in Peoria, Ill.
- From: "Bill Sheehan" <zerowaste@grrn.org>
- Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 09:55:02 -0500
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 11, 2002
Contact: Peter Anderson
608-219-0655 mobile; 608-231-1100
anderson@recycleworlds.org
WASTE MANAGEMENT INC. ATTEMPT TO RECAPTURE YARD TRIMMINGS
FOR ITS LANDFILLS DEFEATED IN PEORIA, ILL.
(PEORIA, Ill.) In what is seen by national environmental
groups as the first major assault on recycling since recovery
laws were enacted in the early 1990s, an attempt by garbage
giant Waste Management Inc. to recapture grass and leaves
for its landfills was defeated last night by the Peoria County
Board.
County Board supervisor Brian Elsasser led the 11 to
7 vote to reject the motion by labeling it "a step backwards
for the County's recycling efforts."
The Board heard a request, supported by the waste
giant and the City of Peoria, to petition the area's legislative
delegation to repeal the state's yard trimmings ban for five
years. Illinois enacted a prohibition on landfilling of grass
and leaves in 1990. Similar bans in 21 other states have
played a major role in diversion of material from landfills.
In some places these yard bans have been responsible for as
much as half of recovery efforts.
The Coalition to Oppose Attacks on Recycling in
America, a national coalition of environmental groups
organized by Athens GA-based GrassRoots Recycling
Network and including the Sierra Club, the Natural
Resources Defense Council and Friends of the Earth, rallied
behind the local environmental group, Peoria Environmental
Action Committee for the Earth, to defeat the first major
assault on recycling since recovery laws were enacted in the
early 1990s.
"Waste Management Inc. was caught with its hands in
the cookie jar," said Bill Sheehan, executive director the
GrassRoots Recycling Network. "The vote was a
resounding victory for America's favorite environmental
activity. We hope this will dissuade the waste giants from
further attempts to undermine recycling and composting."
Coalition spokesperson Peter Anderson warned the
County that "answering Waste Management's siren song
would brand Peoria as the Dayton, Tennessee, of the 21st
Century." Dayton was the location of the Scopes Monkey
Trial in 1921.
Waste Management Inc., which operates the Peoria
landfill, argued that yard trimmings should be returned to
the landfill for a five-year test. The company claimed that
the landfill was a so-called 'bioreactor' in which liquids are
deliberately added to the site to encourage decomposition.
It said it wanted to determine whether returning grass and
leaves to the landfill would accelerate decomposition of
paper and food.
In addition to the fact that repealing the ban on
landfilling yard trimmings would undermine recycling
efforts, Anderson advised the Peroia County Board that
"the Peoria landfill actually is not even a 'bioreactor.' The
request to conduct a test is just a ploy to stick the camel's
nose under the tent."
A technical discussion of the issue is posted at
www.grrn.org/landfill/yardtrimmings/
###
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