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Fill 'er up?
?It's not that long ago that Mayor Bob Shepherd mused publicly about the revenue Uxbridge Township could realize by allowing commercial fill operations in the municipality's gravel pits.
In the short time since, the issue has become one of the most contentious issues facing council and Uxbridge residents in some years, and likely will be one of the key components in the upcoming municipal election campaign.
The question of allowing commercial fill operations has already split council. That split resulted in a proposed new fill bylaw being shunted aside Monday. Where council goes from here is, at the moment, unclear. But, rest assured, it will be back centre stage in the not-too-distant future.
Something else that is unclear is why the issue suddenly became so important that council deemed it necessary to find a speedy resolution. What happened within the last few months to make the question of commercial fill operations so desperately in need of action?
The gravel pits have been around for decades. They are not going anywhere. Major construction projects in the GTA will be around for decades and many will need places to send excavation material for years to come. So it is not as though Uxbridge will miss any golden opportunities to make money from commercial fill operations if council takes a long, slow, deliberate, thoughtful and measured approach to the question.
Given the fragile nature of the Oak Ridges Moraine and the aquifer, one can only imagine the disastrous consequences should contaminated fill find its way into any of the pits. Obviously, should commercial fill operations be allowed, stringent rules and regulations must be in place, along with procedures to make as sure as is humanly possible that contaminated loads do not find there way here. And make no mistake about it, organized crime has long found the waste disposal industry is a way to make huge profits by illegal dumping. It's not that many years ago that criminal enterprises were suspected of flushing tanker loads of used oil into rural ditches around the GTA at night.
The Cosmos accompanied Councillors Bev Northeast and Jack Ballinger on a visit to a fill operation in Mount Albert a week ago. A week earlier, Mayor Shepherd and Councillor Ted Eng visited the same site. The operator, Nick Marchese - backed up by representatives of East Gwillimbury - enthused about how the system he has in place absolutely rules out the possibility of any unauthorized loads of fill coming into his pit. We have no reason to disbelieve him and the way he runs his operation appeared praiseworthy. But one thing he said was rather unsettling: “You have to know the good guys from the bad guys.”
The unscrupulous, however, have always found ways to get around road blocks put in their way. If commercial fill operations are allowed in the township, there are a number of entrepreneurs chomping at the bit to get into the business. So it's likely there could be several sites operating at the same time. If they operated at the same capacity as the Mount Albert pit, which we were told can see up to 350 trucks a day pulling in, would that increase the chances of contaminated fill coming in?
Slow down, council. There's no rush.
