By NICOLE CARTRETTE
Staff Writer

A landfill planned for Columbus County may not have to play by new rules.

While tougher regulations for landfills are being considered in the N.C. legislature, Rep. Dewey Hill and Sen. R.C. Soles Jr. both say there is talk of a separate piece of legislation that would exempt a 107-acre regional landfill planned for the Green Swamp from some, if not all, of those rules.

Both Soles and Hill say they would be opposed to such legislation.

“I am not in favor of that and will not support that,” Soles said, adding that the need for a place to dispose of trash is realized.

“Columbus County needs a landfill, but whether the Green Swamp is the right place for it or not I don’t know,” Hill said. “If they are going to dodge all the environmental rules, anywhere they put it would be wrong.”

Hill said he believes extending the moratorium would be the best thing to do.

“I certainly don’t want it,” Soles said of the Green Swamp landfill, but made it clear the same rules should apply to it as any other. “If it ends up in the Green Swamp it should be as secure and safe as any other in the state.”

Friends of the Green Swamp is an environmental group opposed to the landfill and affiliated with the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League.

FOGS Chairman Stephen Smith said Tuesday the group had received information that a bill to relax the laws for the proposed landfill was scheduled to be discussed in a Senate Agriculture committee Thursday.

“We don’t know the particulars of it,” Smith said. “Any lessening of that (the Environmental Review Commission’s recommendations) we would not support.”

The landfill project in Columbus County was initiated by Riegel Ridge, LLC, a subsidiary of Waste Management, in March 2000.

County records indicate that the original developers involved turned the project over completely to Waste Management a few years ago.

In March, the N.C. Division of Environment and Natural Resources, Waste Management Division made recommendations, if passed into law, that would make the permitting process for landfills more costly and environmental protections more strict.

Some of those recommended changes include putting up $3 million in case of a leak, upgraded liners, required traffic impact studies, stream buffers and full financial disclosure.
There has been no word from Columbus County officials on what effect, if any, the recommendations have had on the landfill project in the Green Swamp.

County Manager Jim Varner said in March he had “no earthly idea” if the recommendations made would affect the Riegel Ridge landfill proposal but pointed out the commissioners had given the company “the green light.”

The project had not obtained a permit to construct or a permit to operate when a moratorium was imposed statewide last year. The company had jumped several other hurdles.

Prior to that, the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers issued a permit allowing developers to fill in a two-thirds acre wetland at the location southwest of N.C. 211 at Roberts Road.

Opposition from groups such as Friends of the Green Swamp emerged and the group unsuccessfully challenged a state water quality permit the developers had been issued.

With the blessings of five of seven Columbus County Commissioners and promises of $1 million in county revenue, the project continued to move forward until state legislation would bring all landfill projects in the state to a halt.

That state moratorium on landfills is set to expire Aug. 1.