Hubbard Township Trustee Rick Hernandez shows the location that Transrail wants to locate a landfill off Drummond Avenue. The Environmental Review Appeals Commission approved allowing a permit to operate the landfill. A public meeting by TC Board of Health will be held 6 p.m. Aug. 9 at Hubbard city building on the matter.

HUBBARD — Will Hubbard, the first exit into the state and the last exit out of the state on Interstate 80, become known for the sights and smells of a landfill?

That has Hubbard city and township officials worried after the latest ruling in a 15-year-plus saga pitting local health and government officials and residents against the landfill first proposed shortly after Trans Rail America bought property in 2003 on Drummond Avenue in Hubbard Township.

The property was transferred in 2012 to RBS Ohio LLC, but Trans Rail has been pursuing motions and appeals through courts and review boards since the company first filed an application in 2004 to put in a landfill — an application the Trumbull County Combined Health District ruled was incomplete later that year, according to documents filed by the Environmental Review Appeals Commission.

Following stints in front of various courts throughout the years, including the Ohio Supreme Court, ERAC in May gave the latest ruling in favor of Trans Rail, putting it back in the hands of the Trumbull County Combined Health District to make a decision on the company’s application.

The combined health district will host a meeting 6 p.m. Monday at the Hubbard City Administration Building, 220 W. Liberty St., where government officials are asking concerned residents from the city and township to come and make their voices heard.

Engineers and attorneys will be there to speak about the application before the board makes a ruling, said Kris Wilster, director of environmental health for the district.

Wilster said he cannot determine what actions the company may pursue if the health district denies permission to move forward, or whether appeals or other avenues may be available to the company.

The company pursued permission to operate under the old standards set for such landfills, to be grandfathered in under old rules and regulations before the rules were updated in 2005.

“Under the grandfathered rules and regulations, these monstrous landfills can locate within 50 feet of a resident’s drinking water well and 100 feet from homes and wetlands,” said Hubbard Township Trustee Rick Hernandez in an announcement for the meeting.

Meanwhile, the new, updated regulations for such landfills “are much stricter,” he states.

“The new legislation says that construction, demolition and debris landfill must locate 500 feet from a drinking water well, 500 feet from a wetland and 500 feet from any resident’s homes,” Hernandez said.

SEES NO GOOD

If the landfill is permitted, there will be health and property value repercussions, Hernandez said.

“I see no good in both the city and township if this dump were to locate here. These are toxic, unhealthy operations that will affect our (health) and our families’ health through leachate, the underground runoff, penetrating our drinking water. Property values will be affected and plummet as well,” Hernandez warns in the statement.

Hubbard Mayor Ben Kyle said he expects neighboring properties to lose 20 percent of their value if the landfill is built.

“There is a street within a stone’s throw away, with residential housing. It would be detrimental to the township and the city; it would be a huge hindrance and have a negative effect on appearance, health and safety, development and property values,” Kyle said. “It would be sad.”

Hernandez said he believes the application will have similar deficiencies to the 2004 application, though Kyle said he is worried if ERAC allowed the process to move forward, the health district’s hands could be tied.

“I believe evidence will show that it is the same application with the same deficiencies. I believe the Trumbull County Health Board’s responsibility is to vote ‘no’ if this is the case,” Hernandez said.

The health district submitted the application to an engineering firm to review and provide a recommendation.

Attempts to reach Trans Rail were unsuccessful, but representatives of the company are expected to attend the hearing.

EYELINE OF TRAVELERS

Hernandez said the proposed landfill would be on more than 20 acres near the railroad tracks off Drummond Avenue and Mount Everett Road, and below Interstate 80, which passes through the township. The railroad tracks go around the landfill, where construction and demolition debris likely will be brought in, if the application is approved.

Kyle said the dump would be in the eyeline of travelers on Interstate 80, offering them an eyesore as the first and last view of Ohio.

With a high water table in the area, wetlands, local wells and no safeguards in place because of the grandfathered regulations that could apply, Kyle said the landfill would be a disaster.

“It’s a low-lying area with a high water table, just a terrible location. It would destroy us,” Kyle said.

Hubbard’s drinking water could be affected, too, Hernandez said, because the Little Yankee Creek is nearby off Drummond Avenue and feeds the Shenango Reservoir, where Hubbard gets its water.

And, the materials dumped in the landfill are expected to come from other states, Hernandez said.

“It is all other people’s junk from other states that they want to dump in our backyard here,” Hernandez said.

The issue ERAC decided was whether Trans Rail’s application was eligible to be grandfathered in or not based on four criteria. The commission decided it was eligible.

Former area state Rep. Michael Verich is one of three members on the appeals commission, and they all voted in favor of Trans Rail. Kyle said he thought Verich might be helpful in making the decision, but the local connection didn’t matter in the end.

Verich did not respond to a voicemail left with him about the issue.

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