Engineer: Proposed Texas Landfill Will Discharge Waste

Jul. 27–RAYMONDVILLE — A proposed landfill would discharge waste that would fill the region’s main drainage channel, backing up water that would damage agricultural land, an irrigation district engineer testified Tuesday.

In seven hours of testimony, a team of attorneys representing local residents and ranchers tried to show that the proposed 630-acre regional landfill would also pose a risk to threatened or endangered species.

In the second day of what’s expected to be a week of testimony, state Judge Sarah Ramos gathered evidence to rule on whether the state should grant Abilene-based Tan Terra Environmental Services a permit to build the proposed landfill about 1.5 miles from Lasara.

Within 10 years, the proposed landfill would grow to discharge waste that would tax the region’s main drainage channel, backing up water that would stagnate to damage agricultural land, said Al Blair, the Delta Lake Irrigation District’s engineer.

While the district charges the proposed landfill would not have legal right to discharge waste water in the channel, Tan Terra attorney Brent Ryan told Blair that the district could not deny it access because it would become a tax-paying customer.

“The district does have an easement and it owns that easement,” Blair replied, referring to the district’s easement on the channel.

In other testimony, attorneys tried to show the proposed landfill posed an environmental risk to threatened or endangered species.

The proposed landfill would attract seagulls that could threaten the interior least tern, an endangered bird species that nests near El Sal del Rey, the salt lake that’s part of a wildlife refuge and lies about a half-mile from the proposed project site, attorneys said.

Monday, Tan Terra engineering consultant David Poe told attorney Rick Lowerre that floodwater could send spilled waste into the drainage channel that flows into the Laguna Madre.

But Poe also argued that the project’s system of culverts and storage ponds would safeguard against the flow of wastes into the channel.

Ramos will rule on whether to grant the permit on Oct. 18, said Andrea Morrow, spokeswoman for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

The Commission will issue the final ruling in a public meeting to be set in Austin, she said.

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