Landfill smell prompts county to explore waste disposal options

That was part of a recommendation unanimously adopted by the county's Solid Waste Advisory Committee following hundreds of odor complaints about the Stony Hollow from people in Moraine, and Dayton, Jefferson Twp., Kettering, Miami Twp., Oakwood and West Carrollton, among others.

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Stony Hollow is owned by Waste Management and Cherokee Run is operated by Republic Services.

“Within our contracts, what we would do is we would look to haul additional waste to Cherokee Run, which means that we wouldn’t be hauling that to Stony Hollow,” said Montgomery County Administrator Joe Tuss.

“Under our current contract we haul a significant amount of our solid waste (to Cherokee Run),” he said. “What we’re going to look at is whether we can then begin to haul additional, so that we reduce the amount that we haul to Stony Hollow and, therefore, are not contributing any more to the issues that may be occurring with regard to the odor complaints and the odor issues that have been ongoing off and on for the better part of a year.”

The advisory committee vote came after the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency said this week that Stony Hollow has complied with its orders issued late last year to address the odors.

The landfill has made “significant” progress in controlling odors at the South Gettysburg Avenue site, said Frank Fello, a Waste Management senior manager.

“We hope that you would give some time for these actions to prove themselves,” Fello said.

A sewer overflow last October near Stony Hollow caused significant odor issues and forced more than 10 cleanup crews to seek medical attention, Dayton records show. It also led to the city barring it from discharging waste into Dayton's sewer system.

In November, Stony Hollow's odor issue became the focus of a class-action federal lawsuit.

A few weeks later, Moraine City Manager David Hicks asked the county to stop hauling waste to the landfill until the site proved it could control its emissions.

Pat Turnbull, county environmental services director, said provisions of the contract with Waste Management “preclude the county from contracting with a new vendor without a competitive bidding process.”

The advisory committee on Wednesday also voted to start a competitive bidding process once its contract with Stony Hollow expires in mid-2018, Turnbull said.