by Philip Gillemot

A public meeting was held on October 8 at the Seneca Falls Community Building concerning the controversial Seneca Meadows Landfill (SMI). This landfill, the largest in New York State, was slated to close at the end of 2025. Its application to the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to enlarge and continue operating it until 2040 has been amended at least twice in the last two years and the DEC has asked the landfill’s owner, Texas-based Waste Connections, to supply needed information repeatedly.

Over 100 people attended the meeting. A panel of invited speakers included Seneca Lake Guardian Vice President Yvonne Taylor, Assemblymember from Ithaca Anna Kelles, Assemblymember from Brooklyn Emily Gallagher, Mark Pitifer from Waterloo Container, and community resident & mother Michelle Grillone. Seneca Lake Guardian President Joseph Campbell was the moderator.

The panel spoke of the environmental problems that the landfill has created, and which would worsen with its expansion and continued operation. The panel also answered questions from the audience.

Waterloo Container manufactures glass bottles (including those for wine) and is located virtually across the street from SMI. Mr. Pitifer spoke about Illnesses of employees stemming from breathing the frequent and intense odors coming from the landfill and that employees have quit due to the smell. He said that there was nothing like its smell and that having your head in dumpster on a humid summer day would not come close to it. 

Another panelist said that the landfill is causing long term damage to environment and that we need to maintain a long-term vision of maintaining our environment.

Ms. Grillone stated that keeping her kids healthy and safe is her #1 priority but that by living in the area she feels that she is not doing that. She has picked up her children multiple times from school due to headaches, dizziness, and nausea. The issue of her kids wanting to play outside has become a daily battle: her kids want to play, but she wants to protect them by keeping them inside. Her son has had asthma and other respiratory issues for 11 years and was home sick with pneumonia at the time of the meeting. She needed to leave the meeting early to check on him. 

A local winemaker stated that SMI’s expansion plan is not sustainable or compatible with a thriving agrotourism industry. 

Assemblymember Kelles remarked that a public comment period for the SMI license renewal probably would start in November and that typically a public comment period is for 30 days. If so, she will ask to increase the comment period to get the word out. She noted that when there were huge numbers of public comments, it worked every time. She also spoke of legislation that would decrease the amount of plastic in packaging and have producers assume municipalities’ cost of waste management and recycling. She also noted that there were more lobbyists than she had ever seen who kept it from passing the NYS Legislature so far.  

Ms. Kelles also commented on the PFAS Discharge Disclosure Act, which she sponsored and which passed the Legislature this spring, but which has not been signed by Gov. Hochul yet. The Act would require certain industrial and wastewater facilities in New York to monitor for and report per‑ and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) before being discharged into state waters. She called on those present to call the governor to sign it. 

You can register your comments with Gov. Hochul concerning this Act at (518) 474-8390. Assemblymember Gallagher said that to effectively fight Waste Connections, people need to turn from dismay and channel their anger into joining together. She also spoke about legislation that could hold corporate leaders criminally responsible for their environmental harm.

From the audience, 11-year-old Leo Mull spoke that he didn’t want to continue to worry if the outside air would smell so bad that he couldn’t play soccer or whether his family would need to shut the doors and windows and still smell the landfill inside. He said that these are issues that the adults in charge are supposed to solve. He said that he just wanted to play outside and asked that the adults do their job to protect the community. 

At the same time of the public meeting, there was a monthly Town Board Meeting at the Seneca Falls Municipal Building. According to Fingerlakes1.com, during public comment, former town landfill consultant Michael Coia urged officials to strengthen testing and treatment provisions in the agreement governing leachate sent from Seneca Meadows to the town’s wastewater plant. (Wastewater treatment plants generally currently do not have the ability to filter out PFAS from wastewater, and thus PFAS gets dumped into the waterways untreated.)

Mr. Coia questioned whether the agreement adequately addressed PFAS and other substances the municipal plant might not remove. 

Seneca Meadows District Manager Kyle Black defended the landfill’s existing treatment operation. He said it removes approximately 99% of PFAS and that material sent to Seneca Falls (wastewater treatment plant) is tested and complies with the agreement.

Black said the company was pursuing additional PFAS removal technology. He attributed delays to continuing questions from the Department of Environmental Conservation.

He also said PFAS enters municipal sewer systems from sources beyond landfill leachate and that municipalities should prepare for possible future treatment requirements.

The exchange ended without a vote to amend the agreement.