August 17, 2006 | Read Time: 4 minutes
Uncovered dump trucks full of twisted metal, crumbling drywall, and other Hurricane Katrina
debris no longer rumble through Village de l’Est, in New Orleans, raising dust and shedding trash on the way to a 100-acre landfill off Chef Menteur Highway.
Much to the relief of residents, the landfill is scheduled to be closed this week. It is the latest development in arguments over hurricane-debris dumps that have pitted nonprofit organizations against government officials — and complicated one of the most basic tasks of rebuilding: getting rid of the trash produced by Katrina.
The closing of the massive landfill, which sits near the Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge and a densely populated Vietnamese-American neighborhood, is a victory for Citizens for a Strong New Orleans East, a coalition of unlikely bedfellows.
Formed by a nonprofit environmental group, a social-services organization, and a Catholic church, none of which had worked together before, the coalition was galvanized by a February agreement between Mayor Ray Nagin and Waste Management of Louisiana, the company that operated the landfill.
Faced with an estimated 7.6 million tons of hurricane garbage, Mr. Nagin agreed that 2.6 million tons of it could be deposited at the site, using emergency powers to issue an executive order that created the landfill and circumvented the normal permit process. Mr. Nagin argued that it would take too long and cost too much to transport the debris to sites farther away. An added incentive was a promise from the waste company to donate 22 percent of the money it made from the dump back to the ravaged city.
While local residents understood the need to get rid of the waste, many did not buy Mr. Nagin’s arguments. “I can understand the urgency, but there are people here,” says James Bui, regional director of the National Alliance of Vietnamese Service Agencies, a member of the coalition.
A six-month-long battle ensued, with the mayor and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality, which said the landfill posed no public-health risks, on one side.
On the other side: the coalition, with university scientists, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and, finally, newly elected city-council members, weighing in against the dump. Residents of the Vietnamese-American neighborhood also organized a protest outside New Orleans City Hall.
At the coalition’s request, scientists at Louisiana State University examined whether the landfill would affect the surrounding area and determined that the debris could contaminate water above and below ground, a hazard for local Vietnamese-Americans who grow fruits and vegetables in their backyards across a narrow canal from the landfill.
“You don’t just ignore people who live next to these things,” says Mr. Bui.
Parishioners at Mary Queen of Vietnam Church, another coalition member, said that the anticipated mound of waste, projected to be 80 feet high, would hurt their plans to improve the neighborhood. The garbage pile, they noted, would be taller than the steeple of the new church they are building.
Worse yet, the landfill lay along the same path as the water that surged through New Orleans after the hurricane, says Marylee M. Orr, executive director of the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, which helped found Citizens for a Strong New Orleans East.
“If there were another storm surge,” she says, “it would have washed all that trash right on top of people.”
Such arguments prevailed: Last month, the mayor said he would not renew his executive order to keep the landfill operating, although most people involved in the debate had expected him to do so.
The coalition’s recent success has already inspired other community groups, including several that represent black residents, to join forces with Citizens for a Strong New Orleans East. They want to draw Congressional attention to illegally dumped refrigerators, cars, and other trash sitting in local bayous in violation of federal law. They also want state and local government agencies to help clean up their part of town.
The coalition has helped less-affluent people in New Orleans learn the power of speaking up, says Mr. Bui, and government officials will be hard-pressed to ignore them again.
“We’re just too much of a rabble-rouser here,” he says, “too much of a headache.”
