By XAVIER SMERDON
AN ESCALATING feud between a group of Wyndham resident’s and their own council has been taken to VCAT.
Members of the Western Region Environment Centre, along with other Wyndham residents and landowners fighting against the height of the landfill at the council’s tip, have called for the council to remove the above ground waste.
While the council was already making a submission to the court to remove a height reference on their planning permit, the residents used the opportunity to call for the landfill to be returned to ground level.
Members of the WREC said the landfill was bad for Wyndham.
“We will not put up with this smelly eyesore and the stigma it will impose on our community for the next 40 years. We will fight the council and any other bodies that try to continue building waste mountains,” farmer Julian Menegazzo said.
The WREC also started a petition to the State Government calling for stricter height regulations for waste landfills in order to protect communities from “the odours and visual intrusion that accompanies waste mountains”.
“If council doesn’t pick up its game and run this landfill responsibly and in the interest of local ratepayers then they don’t deserve to run a landfill at all,” the Director of the WREC, Harry van Moorst said.
“This is a case of not in our backyard and not in anyone else’s backyard either.”
“We are optimistic that the Government, and its agencies such as Sustainability Victoria and the EPA, will realise that if they want to maintain the legitimacy of waste landfills they must act to protect the community and the environment from ridiculous above ground mountains of rubbish like this one” he said.
Wyndham Council CEO Kerry Thompson said it was the council that initiated the VCAT proceedings to remove to remove a reference increasing the landfill to a height of 100 metres.
“WREC and nearby landowners requested to join the hearing and have formally rejected Council’s position during mediation so therefore this must now proceed to a full merits hearing,” Ms Thompson said.
“In the last week, opponents have requested the landfill height be reduced to eight metres above ground level and have applied for this matter to be joined with Council’s initial request to remove a height reference.”
“The request to reduce the height of the landfill by disturbing the mounds and moving the waste elsewhere presents concerns from an environmental perspective, particularly in relation to odour. Disturbing an existing mound would be like cracking open an egg and then trying to put the shell back on again.”
MS Thompson said the council was working on improving the look of the tip.
“Wyndham Council has allocated $1.9 million in 2013/4 to undertake rehabilitation and screening works, to improve visual amenity of the site. Seeding of the existing mounds has taken place in the last 4 weeks and further works will continue,” she said.
“The landfill has operated as an above ground facility for decades without issue and continues to be a resource for our community.”
