
{"id":1457,"date":"2007-12-13T08:18:06","date_gmt":"2007-12-13T16:18:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2007\/12\/13\/transfer-station-questions-linger\/"},"modified":"2011-12-10T13:38:27","modified_gmt":"2011-12-10T18:38:27","slug":"transfer-station-questions-linger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2007\/12\/13\/transfer-station-questions-linger\/","title":{"rendered":"Transfer station questions linger"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/12\/burying-garbage5resized.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/12\/burying-garbage5resized.jpg\" height=\"194\" width=\"260\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Photo by Norman Barbee Sr.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>By Taylor Sisk<\/strong><br \/>\nStaff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>This story is the fourth in a series that examines issues related to environmental justice and to the fight of the Rogers and Eubanks roads community to be relieved of what they allege to be an undue burden. To read the stories in this series and for other resources, go to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/rogers-road\">www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/rogers-road<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Did Mike Nelson feel rotten when he voted in favor of placing a solid-waste transfer station on Eubanks Road?<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Oh, god, yes,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d says Nelson, a member of the Orange County Board of Commissioners.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think it was difficult for almost everyone involved,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he says of the unanimous decision made by the board last March, a decision that has since been overturned after the community, led by the Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism, intensified its efforts at bringing attention to what they believe to be an environmental injustice. After 35 years of having lived with the Orange County Landfill and all its attendant consequences, the Rogers-Eubanks community was unwilling to quietly accept this additional burden.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--> \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think that just about any elected official will tell you there are times when they vote on something and they know that there are people who are going to leave the room hurt,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Nelson said in an interview with <em>The Citizen<\/em> shortly after the decision, reflecting on that vote. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153And for me, that was one of those nights. I was really torn up about it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Nelson wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t alone in his discomfort: Others among his fellow commissioners felt likewise.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think that I can fairly say that more than one commissioner had trouble with that decision,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d says board member Valarie Foushee. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We agonized over it.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>And while Moses Carey, who was then board chair, said that he felt the decision was made for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153good reasons at the time,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d at the Nov. 5 commission meeting at which it was announced the search for a transfer station location would be reopened he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve had a change of mind about the location of the transfer station on the Eubanks Road site, and \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m going to support restarting the search process, recognizing that it will be well into next year before we resolve this matter again and select another site, if we select another one.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not saying that we should eliminate the Eubanks Road site from further consideration as we go through the search process again,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Carey continued, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153but we do need to decide [if] we want to eliminate it for social justice or other reasons.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Establishing criteria for waste transfer<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The federal Environmental Protection Agency has been putting some consideration into environmental justice concerns the past two decades, and has issued some guidelines on how communities might go about planning for  facilities such as a solid-waste transfer station.<\/p>\n<p>In 1993, the EPA created the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC) to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153provide independent advice, consultation, and recommendations to EPA on matters related to environmental justice.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>In a document published by the NEJAC titled \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Waste Transfer Stations: A Manual for Decision-Making,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d transfer stations are defined as facilities that all serve \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the same basic purpose \u00e2\u20ac\u201c consolidating waste from multiple collection vehicles into larger, high-volume transfer vehicles for more economical shipment to distant disposal sites.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d That waste is then \u00e2\u20ac\u0153loaded into larger vehicles (usually transfer trailers, but intermodal containers, railcars, and barges are also used) for long-haul shipment to a final disposal site \u00e2\u20ac\u201c typically a landfill, waste-to-energy plant, or a composting facility.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Decision-makers have the opportunity,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d the document reads, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153to select the most cost-effective and\/or environmentally protective disposal sites, even if they are more distant.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d A site selection process, it continues, should ensure that siting decisions don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t impose \u00e2\u20ac\u0153a disproportionate burden upon low-income or minority communities. Overburdening a community with negative impact facilities can create health, environmental, and quality of living concerns. It can also have a negative economic impact by lowering property values and hindering community revitalization plans.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d These are among the environmental justice considerations the NEJAC urged should be addressed in a site-selection process.<\/p>\n<p>Moreover, according to the report, a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153siting process that includes continuous public participation is integral to developing a transfer station. The public must be a legitimate partner in the facility siting process to integrate community needs and concerns and to influence the decision-making process. Addressing public concerns is also essential to building integrity and instituting good communications with the community. Establishing credibility and trust with the public is as important as addressing environmental, social, and economic concerns about the solid waste facility.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>As the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Manual for Decision-Making\u00e2\u20ac\u009d affirms, in consolidating waste into larger vehicles, transfer stations create traffic concerns \u00e2\u20ac\u201c congestion, air emissions, noise and wear and tear on the roads \u00e2\u20ac\u201c in the immediate vicinity of the stations. As such, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s urged that priority be given to sites with access to major roadways and that travel routes and traffic impacts be given significant attention. <\/p>\n<p>Among design and operating considerations that should be taken into account are \u00e2\u20ac\u0153haul routes to and from the transfer station that avoid congested areas, residential areas, business districts, schools, hospitals and other sensitive areas.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Given these criteria, many people here now question the transfer station siting process in Orange County.<\/p>\n<p>Rev. Robert Campbell, a longtime resident of the Rogers Road community and a spokesperson for the Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism, is among those who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t believe the county did a very thorough job in its transfer station search. As he said in an April interview with <em>The Citizen<\/em>, his sense at the time, and that of many of his neighbors, was one of inevitability, a belief that in regards to the broader community\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s solid-waste solutions, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153All roads lead back to Eubanks.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153To me, and listening to my neighbors,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said then, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153it was [believed] that we just didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have the power to stop them. We didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have the financial, we didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have political support, we didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have the consensus of the towns around us.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>But things changed.<\/p>\n<p>The Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism reached out to the community as a whole, said Campbell in a recent phone interview, and to the NAACP in particular, pointing to hazards and inconveniences associated with the landfill that the community feels would continue with the placement of a transfer station. <\/p>\n<p>Campbell expressed his particular concern regarding the new elementary school being built on Eubanks Road and 18-wheelers passing up and down the road. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153There needs to be a deep traffic analysis to make sure they do the right things,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Several local elected officials traveled to Greensboro in early March to look at Guildford County\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s transfer station, and were generally impressed by its operation. It can handle over a thousand tons a day and operates six days a week.<\/p>\n<p>(Gayle Wilson, solid-waste management director for Orange County, estimates that based on recent waste tonnages in the county, and assuming being open five and a half days a week, the transfer station here would average about 208 tons a day, with Monday being the heaviest day and Wednesday and Saturday the lightest. Using Greensboro as a gauge, that would mean an average of 10-15 tractor-trailer trucks coming out of the facility each a day.)<\/p>\n<p>The Greensboro station, though, was placed in an industrial area. Greensboro Environmental Services Department director Jeryl Covington says that, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153When we started looking at locations, we knew we could not look in District 2, which was the area where the White Street landfill was.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d An organization called the Concerned Citizens of Northeast Greensboro had successfully fought the placement of another solid-waste facility in their neighborhood. The city determined that consideration of placing a transfer station there was, in Covington\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s words, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153off target.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Likewise, those who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve lived near the Orange County landfill feel that Eubanks Road should be withdrawn from consideration as a transfer station site \u00e2\u20ac\u201c which, as of yet, hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been done.<\/p>\n<p>The Eubanks option, says spokesperson Neloa Jones, must be \u00e2\u20ac\u0153taken off the table \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 if for no other reason than that [this neighborhood] has already been on the table for 35 years, and that was longer than we were promised it had to be.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Commissioners have not yet decided on our criteria for siting the transfer station,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Mike Nelson said in an email this week to <em>The Citizen<\/em>. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I, for one, support taking the Eubanks Road site off the list. I do not know if a majority of my colleagues will support doing so.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p><strong>A different conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153If you find that the decision you made was not the best decision and you have the opportunity to change it, why wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t you?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d asks Orange County Commissioner Valerie Foushee.<\/p>\n<p>What role did outcry and education from by the community play in the decision to reopen the transfer station search?<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Just going through this process of talking about how we might mitigate the impacts of the transfer station brought to light some things that I had already felt,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Foushee says. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153And as we worked through the process, we were given more, or different, information.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153There wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t one, single \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcdefining moment\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 that led me to re-evaluate my position,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d says Nelson. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153During the spring and summer, I heard from a very broad cross-section of Orange County citizens. I listened to what they had to say and balanced that against the seriousness of the County\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s need to make a final decision about how we dispose of our trash. Orange County runs a very real risk of running out of landfill space before a transfer station is sited, so reopening this process was not an easy decision.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153When you talk about the commissioners reconsidering siting the transfer station,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d says Foushee, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153you have to put everything into perspective. The initial decision was based on a set of circumstances as they were presented to us. And I think for me, working on the [Historic Rogers Road Community Enhancement Plan Development and Monitoring Task Force] and then finding out that we had another year left at the landfill, [I thought], \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcOkay, if I take this piece of information and this information, what I conclude is different from what I concluded from the first set of information.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153When the people say \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcyou need to take a look at this\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 or \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcyou need to look at this in this way, in addition to how you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve viewed it previously,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Foushee says, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153or \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcyou need to consider this along with other considerations you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve had,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 for me, I feel like I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m obliged to do that.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Now, if I do that and my thinking changes, then I need to say my thinking changed.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Was an environmental injustice committed in selecting the Rogers-Eubanks community as the site of a solid-waste transfer station?<\/p>\n<p>Many elected officials think so. In a questionnaire submitted by the Coalition to End Environmental Racism, officials were asked, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Does continuing solid waste activities, including building a solid waste transfer station in the Rogers-Eubanks communities, constitute environmental injustice by your definition?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Chapel Hill Town Council member Bill Strom, who also serves as co-chair of the Town of Chapel Hill\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Rogers Road Small Area Plan Task Force, responded by citing a statement he had previously submitted to the local chapter of the NAACP, in which he said, in part:<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Although I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t give a \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcbinding\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 yes or no answer to whether I would vote to permit the proposed transfer station because a special use permit application has been submitted and I am legally required to hear all the evidence before making a decision, I am very concerned about the burden Rogers Road has had to carry for our community over the years. We need to take care of our waste in a way that does not harm the quality of life for minority and under-represented communities.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Carrboro Alderman Dan Coleman wrote: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The transfer station may, in itself, not be the sort of burden the landfill has been but its placement on Eubanks Road nonetheless further burdens the Rogers Road neighbors. It is impossible to separate this placement from the long history of abuses suffered by this neighborhood and by the larger African-American community.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>In a 2000 document titled \u00e2\u20ac\u0153A Regulatory Strategy for Siting and Operating Waste Transfer Stations,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d the NEJAC writes: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The clustering and disproportionate siting of noxious facilities in low-income communities and communities of color led to the creation of the environmental justice movement. The siting and operation of waste transfer stations is such an example.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Further: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The realization of safe siting and operation of waste transfer stations and livable communities requires good-faith collaboration for its implementation.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>And in its manual on decision-making, the NEJAC states: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153A siting process that includes continuous public participation is integral to developing a transfer station. The public must be a legitimate partner in the facility siting process to integrate community needs and concerns and to influence the decision-making process.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>The search in Orange County now continues.<\/p>\n<p><em>In next week\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s <em>Citizen<\/em>: Should we be dumping our garbage on someone else?<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>[correction: The editors have somewhat belatedly noticed two unfortunate errors in the first paragraph of the Nov. 15 installment of this series. The Orange County Commissioners did not, of course, vote to place a transfer station on Rogers Road. They voted to place it on Eubanks Road. And that vote took place in late March, not in April. Our apologies for these errors.]<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Photo by Norman Barbee Sr. By Taylor Sisk Staff Writer This story is the fourth in a series that examines issues related to environmental justice and to the fight of the Rogers and Eubanks roads community to be relieved of what they allege to be an undue burden. To read the stories in this series&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1457"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1457\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22326,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1457\/revisions\/22326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}