Two weeks before he left office and shortly after County Executive Marc Elrich was elected, Ike Leggett secretly signed a “change order” agreement to extend the County’s contract with Covanta for another four years of garbage incineration. He did this knowing full well that Elrich campaigned on a promise to close the incinerator. In the past, when the contract was up for renewal, it was reviewed by the County Council before signature by the county executive. This time Leggett completely hid the renewal from the Council and the public. SCA and our allies are currently carefully reviewing the original contract and the change order to see if they can be nullified. Failing this, we—with your help—will push for a clean air ordinance that would either clean this polluting burner up or more likely, effectively force Covanta to close on economic grounds. It really is too expensive to burn our trash in a way that does not pollute our community.

Baltimore--the only other community in MD with a garbage incinerator--is leading the way; their City Council has just unanimously passed such an ordinance. It will require much safer pollution controls on the Baltimore Wheelabrator and medical waste incinerator—or force them to close down, rather than comply with these healthier air measures. 

What will we do with our trash when the incinerator shuts down? We’re aggressively working on a zero waste management plan that will eventually reduce our waste stream more than the incinerator. Including food waste composting and unit pricing—where those who produce more garbage pay more than those who produce less—will immediately cut our trash load in half. Other strategies, still in the planning stage will further reduce our waste. There are at least two large, privately owned and properly managed landfills in Virginia that are accessible by rail from the Montgomery county transfer station. It would be relatively inexpensive to ship our reduced trash stream there. Currently, the 600,000 tons of trash we burn produces 200,000 tons of toxic ash,which is delivered to a landfill just outside of Richmond, VA—located near a community of color. Shutting the incinerator would dramatically reduce our County’s greenhouse gas contributions—as well as help clean our air!

(click to view documents)