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ROTTERDAM
Neighbors upset by glass recycler
Women: Dust causes asthma
BY JUSTIN MASON Gazette Reporter

   The steady procession of heavy trucks hauling recyclables down Moyer Avenue mean big business for County Waste & Recycling.
   For county officials, the privately operated semis and dump trucks mean one less demand on local taxes.
   But for Jackie Barber, the traffi c means a filthy block, a lingering stench of garbage each summer and a child with respiratory problems that never seem to go away.
   Across the street from her small Cape Cod house on Moyer Avenue lies the county-owned recycling plant, which processes hundreds of tons of waste each week from around the region. Glass and garbage left behind by the sheer volume of recyclables processed at the facility sometimes leaves the residences looking quite out of place along a street also home to the county Public Works Department.
   But the condition of the neighborhood isn’t Barber’s main con- cern. It’s the dust coming from the plant’s glass-crushing unit, which she believes is causing serious upper-respiratory problems for her 5-year-old son, Ethan.
   Complaints from Barber and another neighbor about the facility prompted recent visits from both the county Department of Health and the state Department of Environmental Conservation, but no corrective action. Town officials contacted the county about possible issues at the plant after receiving several complaints over the summer.
   County Public Works Director Joseph Ryan said he contacted the company — Sierra Processing, a subsidiary of the Clifton Parkbased County Waste & Recycling — after receiving the town correspondence. He said he’s trying to set up a meeting between company officials and the neighbors over the concerns.
   “I think a lot of the problems have to do with the sheer volume,” he said.
TONS OF GLASS
   Part of the operation is to crush recycled glass into a fine, sand-like state, which is then reused. Some of the crushed glass is shipped to Colonie, where it’s used to cover the landfill; the town can dump its glass at the recycling facility for free in exchange for taking the crushed product.
   Officially called the Schenectady County Material Recovery Facility, the plant processes recyclable items gathered from around the area. It is next to the county Public Works Department at the intersection of South Thompson Street and Moyer Avenue. The plant consists of one large processing warehouse and
an outdoor glass-crushing unit.
   Glass is loaded onto a conveyor belt inside the plant and then moved to a pulverizing machine outside. After being crushed, the glass is transferred along another belt and dumped on an open-air pile.
   Barber said the open-air glass crushing litters the neighborhood streets and, at times of high volume, pollutes the air. On some days, she said she can see the fine dust on vehicles parked in her driveway and on the ground.
   “It’s almost like a pollen,” she said.
   When Barber first moved to the neighborhood about five years ago, she said her infant son began to develop asthma and chronic sinus infections. She said his worsening condition initially stumped allergists and prompted corrective surgeries.
   Barber thought her son’s problems were unique until a chance conversation about the plant with a neighbor several houses down on South Thompson Street. Joan Monda, a woman in her late 50s living even closer to the facility, exhibited many of the symptoms of Barber’s son and was eventually urged to move out of her home by a doctor, which she did.
   Monda said she started suffering upper respiratory ailments shortly after the facility came under private operation. “I’ve fought with them since the first day,” she said.
   Since moving out of her South Thompson Street residence about a year ago, Monda said many of the respiratory ailments have subsided. She said many of the agencies she’s contacted about her problems haven’t seemed too concerned about her problems because they don’t seem dire.
   “Because it’s not cancer, they think I should just live with it,” she said.
NO ANSWERS
   Barber and Monda have spoken out about their problems with the facility and even coordinated a petition from some of the residents nearby. They consulted both county and state agencies about her problems, but never seem to get a satisfactory answer.
   “Everyone wants to wash their hands of it and blame it on someone else,” Barber said.
   Barber claims the problems around the facility started sometime after the private company took over and have gradually gotten worse. Over the past three years, she said, the truck traffic has increased, the garbage stench has become unbearable and her son’s health problems have worsened.
   “When we first moved here, the child didn’t have an allergy to anything,” she said.
   Since 1999, the plant has been operated by Sierra Processing. The Schenectady County Legislature leased the facility to the fi rm because a downtrend in recycling business and a costly worker’s compensation case had made it unprofitable to operate.
   County Waste & Recycling, the parent company, is the largest regional waste-management fi rm and is among the top-grossing firms in the nation. The company took in more than $73 million in revenues in 2006 and is expected to gross more than $90 million this year, according to Waste Age, a trade magazine that annually ranks the top companies in the industry.
   Schenectady County Attorney Chris Gardner said Sierra Processing recently renewed its threeyear lease, which pays the county $77,000 each year. As part of the agreement, the company agreed to accept all of the recyclables from Schenectady’s seven municipalities, in addition to those produced at the county buildings.
   An official with County Waste & Recycling who declined to give his name was unaware of any problems at the Rotterdam facility or efforts to fix them. Other messages left with the company and Sierra Processing over a three-week period were not returned.
   Officials from the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration were unaware of any complaints from workers at the plant.
   Likewise, Gardner was unaware of any complaints about the facility, aside from a letter to the Legislature from Rotterdam Supervisor Steve Tommasone. The letter acknowledges complaints by residents and requests the county address ongoing concerns with the plant.
COUNTY AWARE
   Officials from the county Department of Health also were contacted by residents about problems with the facility, spokeswoman Glynnis Hunt said. Officials visited the site over the summer and recommended the company cover the crushed glass piles and regularly collect any debris scatted along South Thompson Street and Moyer Avenue.
   Hunt said there are indications Sierra Processing has taken steps to improve and the state Department of Environmental Conservation has been alerted to the air-quality issues raised by Monda and Barber. However, she said, county health has no power of enforcement over Sierra Processing and lacks the resources to ensure the company is complying with the recommendations.
   “It’s not something we have the ability to even go out and monitor if they’re complying,” she said.
   DEC spokesman Rick Georgeson said his agency has received complaints about conditions in the neighborhood, which prompted an inspection over the summer. However, he said there appeared to be no conditions at the plant worthy of action.
   Georgeson said the DEC issued a registration to Sierra Processing, which allows the company to move 80 tons of refuse through the plant per day, and store up to 1,000 tons of material.
   “Because they’re not disposing of waste and it’s more just moving it from one truck to another, we don’t get much involved in the regulation of that.”

Jackie Barber of Moyer Avenue in Rotterdam talks about how residents are upset over the nearby county recycling plant as a truck bound for the plant passes behind her.
MARC SCHULTZ/ GAZETTE PHOTOGRAPHER

She was complaining about this last year (or maybe it was before this summer), I don't remember, but I remember her and at least one of her neighbors who had no medical conditions until they moved into these houses.  This is right behind the Stock Luber Supply (Bellevue Builders), just off of Keller Ave.

It is zoned industrial or light industrial there, is it not???? I dont remember it being anything else? Does anyone know?  And isn't glass silicone, which is dirt, which gets kicked up all the time in the lumber yard and by the trains????

BTW-we used to have Accurate Disposal and now have----da da da da,,,,County Waste.....(as per our new bill we received, thank you for doing business with accurate)--little fishies getting eaten up????

I think they're working together.  I knew the Horvath's (Accurae Disposal), and I don't know that they would have sold out if it meant bad business.  They did take over their father's former business years ago (J.R. and Sons).