Opinion ID: 1936904
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Capacity Restrictions on the Site

Text: Ramsey County was required to obtain approval from two governmental units to operate this facility: the City of Maplewood and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA). Ramsey County conceded that the site was regulated by the MPCA. In the MPCA's Permit-by-Rule Facility Notification Form, Ramsey County certified on May 23, 1990 that it would compost grass and leaves and that the total facility design waste capacity at the site would be 9,000 cubic yards. [3] The capacity restrictions were part of the representations Ramsey County made in order to obtain Permit-by-Rule approval from the MPCA. This capacity limit followed the MPCA mandate that about one acre of land is needed for each 3,000 to 3,500 cubic yards of yard wastes collected. Based on this certification, on July 5, 1990 the MPCA approved Ramsey County's application to compost a maximum of 9,000 cubic yards of grass and leaves on the Beam Avenue site. Ramsey County alleges that it complied with the MPCA's rules. Rebecca Wirth, a MPCA senior pollution control specialist responsible for regulating yard waste sites in Minnesota, including the Beam Avenue site, states that the notification form filled out by an owner or operator of a yard waste composting facility is not a permit and does not have the force of law. According to Wirth, [t]he permit is the rule itself, which contains all of the requirements with which the owner or operator must comply. In August of 1994, the Ramsey County Division of Solid Waste submitted a report to the Maplewood City Council concerning the Maplewood yard waste site. This information was submitted to the city as background for review of the conditional use permit (CUP) for the yard waste site in issue. The following summary illustrates that there were approximately 60,000 visits per year to the site from 1990 to 1994 and that a total of 117,295 cubic yards were received at this site during that time. According to this summary, 39,463 yards were transferred to other locations, leaving over 77,832 cubic yards at the site. No. of Cubic Yards Cubic Yards Cubic Yards Year Visits Received Managed on Site Transferred 1990 60,041 19,123 10,000 9,123 1991 62,497 23,615 15,905 7,710 1992 60,491 22,477 17,317 5,160 1993 66,901 27,480 21,240 6,240 1994 63,127 24,600 13,370 11,230 _______ ______ 117,295 39,463 Beginning in 1991, the City of Maplewood, as regulator, placed restrictions on the operation of the compost site by adopting a CUP, which established the requirements for continued operation of the site. [4] The city council issued the CUP with the resolution that the use would not depreciate property values nor would it involve any activity, process,    or methods of operation that would be dangerous, hazardous, detrimental, disturbing or cause a nuisance to any person    because of    dust, odor    or other nuisances and the use would cause minimal adverse environmental effects. The neighbors of the site had raised concerns about strong odors emanating from the compost site starting in the late 1980s. The CUP specifically conditioned Ramsey County's agreement upon not composting grass clippings at this site, noting [t]he County shall have the grass clippings removed from the site as often as necessary to prevent odors. In 1994, the permit was amended to require Ramsey County to remove grass clippings at least three times per week: Monday, Thursday and Saturday. In 1996, the site was changed from a composting site to a yard waste transfer site. The site was to be monitored continuously when the site was open and a written record kept of the haul out of materials. This was evidently required because of numerous complaints of odor generated at the site. The city also required Ramsey County to pay for an odor consultant, training of city staff for wind and odor monitoring and to pay for the hiring of a third party to verify and measure odors. Thirty-six of the 427 scheduled pickups of grass clippings on that schedule were not made between 1995 and 1999. Ramsey County concedes that these missed pickups were in violation of its CUP, but argues that the error was made by its contractor who unilaterally decided to skip the scheduled pickups. Ramsey County also argues that the amount was minimal and the problem was corrected upon discovery. In June 2000, the Maplewood City Council closed the Beam Avenue site.