The Municipality of Chatham-Kent (CK) is assembling its war chest as it prepares to battle against an unwanted landfill in Dresden.
On Monday evening, CK council will get an update on the dispute and the next steps to stop the landfill.
Administration is also seeking up to $250,000 from reserves for legal, expert, and related costs to oppose the York1 landfill and waste proposal, citing the destructive impacts it will have on Dresden and the surrounding areas.
To date, the municipality said it has spent $108,000 on legal advice, expert engineering analysis, and preliminary traffic analysis.
"As part of this ongoing review process, administration also intends to hire further experts to address the impacts of this proposal. The exact experts are not yet known, and will be determined with advice from the legal team assembled to respond to York1’s Court Action. As the precise experts needed are not yet known, administration is recommending Council approval to retain such experts as are needed and pay for those costs through the insurance and strategic reserves as appropriate," stated a report going to council on Monday night.
The report showed that an engineer has been retained by the municipality to study the potential impacts that truck traffic from the York1 proposal would have on Chatham-Kent roads.
Chatham-Kent has also retained two law firms to defend Dresden from the landfill.
The municipality will be arguing in Chatham Superior Court on September 21 that the property at 29831 Irish School Road in Dresden must conform to municipal land use planning approvals, including zoning bylaws, if the proposal moves forward. York1 disagrees.
Administration noted York1 has indicated they have changed the scope of the proposal. However, Chatham-Kent has not received a detailed proposal of what York1 is seeking, according to staff.
Bkejwanong- Walpole Island First Nation has joined a legal challenge of Bill 5, which is the provincial bill that exempted the landfill from an environmental assessment. Chatham-Kent is not part of that legal process, but it noted it will closely monitor progress as it is very relevant to the York1 proposal.
