Richard Peluso, president of Conerstone Environmental Group of Crystal Run, explains the planned transfer station and materials recovery facility

MONTICELLO – There are literally just weeks left in the life of the Sullivan County Landfill. The future is in exportation, and that dominated much of the day, Thursday, for the County Legislature.

Two companies, which had responded to a request for proposals, made their pitch in the morning.  Both IESI, of Lyndhurst, New Jersey, and Casella, of Ithaca, New York, emphasized track record and a very ‘green’ approach to resource recovery. 

“We want to be invisible in the background in terms of when you put your garbage out, you won’t have to worry about it, but we are there on the other side to help you with marketing of recyclables,” said IESI’s Business Development and Government Relations representative, Andy Moss. 

IESI partners with the upstate Seneca Meadows landfill, near Waterloo, and with Riccelli Enterprises, which has the trucks that will do the hauling from the planned transfer station to be built at the current county landfill. 

“Our whole theme is centered around sustainability,” said Raymond Duerr, Casella’s director of landfill sales and volume, who noted their mission statement:  “We’re giving resources new life.”

Casella is a self-contained operation.

One question from several who listened to the presentations was whether either company would be open to subcontracting to local firms.  Both said they would be, but made no specific promises.

“The county would be in good shape going with either company”, said County Manager David Fanslau. 

All either company would be doing is taking trash from the transfer station and materials recovery facility, and removing it from Sullivan County.

The county would build the MRF and transfer station, at a cost of perhaps $6 to $7 million.  Despite the county’s sever fiscal situation, this is not something the county can’t do, said Fanslau.

“That would be a bond, as well, but the debt service associated with that is enclosed in the proposed user fee scenario.”

The county is working on a new multi-stepped fee schedule that would replace tipping fees.  If adopted, it would be based on type of property generating the waste and a formula for estimating the average waste generated by different properties, such as single-family homes, apartments, bungalows, restaurants and large businesses, among others.  That would become part of the annual tax bill.