By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
State approval and expedited work to prepare a new cell should enable the St. Joseph landfill to continue uninterrupted operations.
St. Joseph Public Works Director, Abe Forney, says the city has received approval from the Missouri Department of Natural Resources to pile trash in Cell #7 470,000 cubic yards higher.
“So we don’t have to relocate all of that trash now,” Forney tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. “We can just continue to receive the trash from the haulers and fill up Cell #7 without bringing over the excess trash that we had previously piled up to give us more space.”
Forney says contractor M-Con has nearly completed the digging of Cell #8 and will soon be spreading clay on the new cell, which will take three to four weeks. Liner and leachate piping comes next. Then, the city must wait for DNR approval.
“I’m thinking around July – August timeframe is when it’ll be done.”
Forney says the twin moves have taken pressure off the landfill.
“If the trash continues to come in at the rate that it is and we really appreciate all the trash haulers reducing some of the trash that they’re bringing in,” Forney says. “And us getting this vertical expansion, we believe that it gives us enough time to get Cell #8 opened.”
Forney says the city hopes to learn from this ordeal.
“I really appreciate everybody’s patience,” Forney says. “We knew that there was a lot of trash coming in, but we didn’t foresee this circumstance and we got behind the power curve. I’ll take ownership of it. We screwed up and we’re doing everything that we can to eliminate the problem.”
Forney says since the city issued the contract for M-Con to prepare Cell #8, it has shifted city workers to begin preparation of Cell #9 to ensure it doesn’t run into this situation again.
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