Great Rivers Environmental Law Center has appealed to the Illinois Pollution Control Board on behalf of American Bottom Conservancy and the Sierra Club in opposition to Waste Management's proposed new North Milam landfill. The organizations are appealing the siting decision by the City of Madison for both procedural unfairness as well as noncompliance with the Illinois state environmental laws. The new landfill would be constructed on land that contains Native American remains and artifacts, and is within 2100 feet of Cahokia Mounds National Historic Landmark boundaries and Horseshoe Lake State Park.

Waste Management owns and operates the existing Milam landfill, located in Fairmont City in St. Clair County, and calls the proposed landfill an expansion. The new landfill would be located on the other side of the Cahokia Canal in the City of Madison in Madison County. Waste Management was required to seek siting approval from the City of Madison, which would receive approximately a million dollars annually in host agreement fees from the company. Madison voted to approve the application and the organizations are appealing that approval.

American Bottom Conservancy and the Sierra Club contend that the siting process was not “fundamentally fair,” a legal term which requires minimal standards including the opportunity to be heard, the right to cross-examine adverse witnesses, and impartial rulings on the evidence. Here, the decision to approve the landfill was based on information not available to the public and not subject to cross-examination. Additionally, Illinois rules require that a landfill not be located in an area that is incompatible with the character of the surrounding area.

“Landfills do not belong in the floodplain, not in wetlands, not adjacent to a state park and lake, not within two thousand feet of the Cahokia Mounds National Historic Landmark boundary-and certainly not on or adjacent to Indian remains,” said Kathy Andria, chair of the Illinois Sierra Club Waste and Recycling Task Force and president of American Bottom Conservancy. ABC member Ruben Aguirre, a member of the Tongva Nation, pleaded at the public hearing with Madison City Council members to not desecrate sacred land and allow refuse to be placed where the ancients are buried. “St. Louis needs to find someplace else to put its garbage,” says Aguirre.