Jeffrey Kleinman, attorney for the Stop the Dump Coalition and its allies, filed the organization's brief with LUBA, the state Land Use Board of Appeals, on Earth Day, April 22. The legal brief highlights the many errors made by Yamhill County and Riverbend Landfill Company in reconsidering Riverbend's latest request to expand its dump on the South Yamhill River.
In rejecting the County's initial approval in 2015, LUBA directed the County to require Riverbend to prove that the expansion would not significantly harm farming near the dump. The County had mistakenly put the burden on farmers to show that the expansion would be harmful.
Farmers alleged harm to their crops from litter (which fouls harvesting equipment and makes baled hay unusable), birds (especially seagulls and crows; the gulls damage newly-planted grass, the crows attack livestock, and bird poop damages all crops), noise (which stresses poultry), and odor (which discourages customers from shopping at farms downwind of the dump).
Instead of soliciting new evidence on these and other points at a new hearing the County held last February, however, the County relied heavily on new arguments based on the evidence it had rejected the year before. To no one's surprise, the result was the same: expansion approval. Stop the Dump promptly appealed.
The brief charges that the County continues to make farmers prove harm. For example, where one farmer said birds harm his fields and another said the birds don't cause any harm, the County found no harm. Legally, however, if evidence on both sides of the harm issue is equal, the County is required to find against Riverbend. That would preclude approval.
Kleinman's brief also cited Riverbend's own evidence that bird hazing methods employed by the landfill cause birds to disperse to nearby farms at exactly the crucial time of year when newly-planted grass has begun to sprout. The County liked the hazing methods so much that it required Riverbend to haze even more.
Riverbend and the County now have a chance to respond. Their written briefs are due May 13. LUBA will then hear live argument from attorneys for all parties on June 2 in Salem. The public is invited:
775 Summer Street NE (the State Lands Building), Land Board Room, 1st Floor, Salem
Thursday, June 2, 2016, at 9:00 AM
