City To Trash Co.: Who You Calling ​“NIMBY”?

A trash company accused New Haven of NIMBYism — and the city responded by accusing the company of environmental injustice for seeking to process more suburban garbage in the polluted Annex neighborhood.

Murphy Road Recycling leveled the NIMBYism claim at a Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) hearing on Tuesday afternoon.

The confrontation surrounded Murphy Road’s controversial request for a special permit to allow its All American Waste facility at 19 Wheeler Str.to process wet (“putrescible”) Municipal Solid Waste, including household trash, in addition to the dry waste that it already processes.

The hearing ended without a decision. Meanwhile the two sides are set to square off again at a City Plan Commission hearing on the project.

The proposal has sparked fierce backlash from neighborhood residents, environmental activists, and city officials. Opponents argue that adding Municipal Solid Waste will come at the cost of the health and environmental conditions of a predominantly low-income neighborhood that has already complained of adverse effects from the waste facility.

Before Tuesday’s hearing, activists gathered with city officials by the Quinnipiac River to protest the proposal.

“We are not a dumping yard for suburban trash,” declared Mayor Justin Elicker.

Environmental advocate Chris Ozyck argued that neighbors are already ​“inundated with rats” and a stench that ​“emanates from this facility.”

Later in the afternoon, Murphy Road Recycling convened with opponents at the DEEP hearing, run by adjudicator Janice Deshais, who will ultimately issue a decision on the special permit.

In its presentation to DEEP, attorney Ed Spinella argued on behalf of Murphy Road that the requested changes wouldn’t significantly change the facility’s operations.

“If this permit is finalized, we will continue to operate the way we have operated since 2007,” Spinella said, noting that the plant had been operated by other companies since 1997. ​“The same trucks will use the site to deliver the material to the site. The same equipment that’s been there since 2007 will continue to be there … We’ll continue to have the same number of employees.”

The facility currently processes a maximum 967 tons of waste per day — a limit that wouldn’t change if the permit for municipal solid waste processing is granted.

The permit would allow the facility to process up to 500 tons of municipal solid waste. The facility would no longer accept waste from street sweepings and storm catch basin cleanings in order to make room for the putrescible waste.

What About Bridgeport?

Spinella noted that New Haven sends all of its 80,000 tons of trash to other towns, mainly Bridgeport — ​“an environmental justice community and a community that is in far more distress than New Haven.”

He stressed ​“how crucial it is for all the towns in Connecticut to work together. Then he invoked NIMBY: ​“If we had the attitude that it would be ​‘Not in my backyard,’” Bridgeport would reject all of New Haven’s waste, he argued.

“It’s not unusual for towns to accept material to other towns,” he added.

These comments prompted Mayor Elicker to criticize Spinella’s suggestion that it is the norm in Connecticut for towns to evenly and equitably share unwanted land uses.

“That fantastical narrative is preposterous and offensive,” Elicker said. ​“What we do in Connecticut is to take our trash and put it on cities like Bridgeport.”

The location of trash processing plants isn’t an issue that should pit cities against one another, Elicker argued; the injustice is that cities are bearing the burden of suburban trash.

“Poor communities handle the state’s trash,” he said. ​“Bridgeport shouldn’t accept this just as we in New Haven shouldn’t.”

Elicker spoke alongside environmental non-profit Save the Sound as a formal challenger to Murphy’s approval request.

Save the Sound’s lawyer Roger Reynolds noted that ​“the Annex is likely the most environmentally overburdened neighborhood in all of Connecticut.”

Residents have already complained of rats and bad odors from the recycling plant, and relative to the state, the neighborhood has a high population of low-income people of color, he said. ​“This is the NIMBY neighborhood that the applicant is accusing of not allowing anything in its backyard.”

An environmental justice review from Connecticut DEEP recommended the imposition of particular constraints on the recycling company’s permit, in order to account for community concerns.

Brend Madho, an environmental analyst with DEEP, presented the following amendments to the potential permit:

Municipal solid waste could be stored for up to 48 hours at the facilityNo trash could be stored outdoors overnightAn independent, third-party inspector would have to inspect the facility every quarterThe property lines would have to be monitored for odors, and Murphy would be required to address any smellsDoors to the facility would have to remain closed except for when trucks enter and exitThe trash company would have to run a 24-hour hotline for residents to lodge complaints about the facility (Madho noted that such a hotline already exists for the waste facility).

Community members who testified at the hearing were not convinced that these measures would be enough to prevent potential adverse effects of the waste on the neighborhood.

Several argued that DEEP’s enforcement of regulations at the site has historically been lax.

“It has not been possible for DEEP to actually inspect the site as often as it needs to be,” stated Anstress Farwell.

Farwell and other neighbors also stressed that processing municipal solid waste could have negative effects on the surrounding community’s health and environment.

Climate change and rising sea levels are a factor, Farwell argued. ​“What is going to happen when you have a tropical storm Sandy?” she asked rhetorically, referring to the damaging hurricane that tore through the East Coast in 2012.

Nancy Alderman, a member of the Quinnipiac River Fund, an organization that sets out to promote the health of the river next to the trash facility, warned of the dangers of PFAS — man-made chemicals that exist in ​“everything from stain resistant carpets to grease-proof pizza boxes,” Alderman said, and that can appear in municipal solid waste — on infant development, endocrine health, and cholesterol levels.

Christel Manning said she often rows a boat in the Quinnipiac River. Her husband fishes, and her daughter swims, in the water. ​“There’s this little colony of people in the summertime who hang out there, and they fish right across from this site. Sometimes, there’s garbage floating in the water. Sometimes it smells. People seem to enjoy it as a recreational spot.”

Fair Haven Heights Alder Rosa Ferraro-Santana criticized Murphy for a lack of transparency with community members, saying that the company did not attend community management team meetings. ​“They only wanted to have meetings at their site,” she said. ​“Most of the meetings were held in an area where [only] some people could get to.”

In a similar call for more communication, some residents advocated for a Spanish-speaking interpreter to attend future public hearings on the subject, as many Annex residents are primarily Spanish speakers.

Deshais said she will hear more testimony on the Murphy Road Recycling proposal at a Jan. 5 meeting, which will be available for pre-registration here.

Maya McFadden contributed reporting.