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At the Oct. 10 meeting of the Kosciusko County Board of Zoning Appeals, the Kosciusko County Landfill will request an exception for the expansion of a sanitary landfill, according to Area Plan Commission assistant director Matt Sandy.
The BZA meeting begins at 8:30 a.m. at the Munson building, North Lake Street.
The property in question is on the east side of Packerton Road and zero feet north of CR 800S.
Sandy said the landfill must request the exception because it's a nonconforming use and an exceptional use. The property is currently zoned agricultural and a landfill is an exceptional use in agricultural zoned property.
Packerton Land Co., which operates the landfill, has acquired 227 acres to the north and west of the current landfill, attorney Steve Snyder said today. Snyder represents the landfill. The preliminary site plan and information on the landfill expansion are available at the plan commission office in the courthouse, he said, for the public to inspect.
Drainage and other concerns will be addressed if the landfill expansion is approved, Snyder said. He said it is common for landfills to be expanded because of legal requirements. The current landfill space, Snyder said, is anticipated to be good for only another seven to eight years. Planning for any expansion, he said, must begin years in advance.
Snyder said, "There's virtually no out-of-state trash that goes into this landfill." Only approximately 2 percent of the waste in the landfill comes from out-of-state and that trash comes from Ohio. "It's not a great receptacle for out-of-state refuse."
The county highway, county surveyor, city of Warsaw, county commissioners and the Kosciusko County Solid Waste Management District have been notified of the landfill expansion request, Snyder said. The county has an interest in it, he said, because they license the landfill. Warsaw has an interest in it because that's where all the city's waste goes.
"Virtually everyone in this county has an interest in their landfill because that's where their trash goes," Snyder said.
At the Kosciusko County Solid Waste Management District meeting Wednesday, director Marsha Eikenberry said Allied Waste Industries, owners of Packerton Landfill Co., plans to file a petition with the Kosciusko County Area Plan Commission for additional lands at the landfill. She said the district will support the expansion of the landfill.
However, when contacted Wednesday, Sandy said they had no petition on file regarding the rezoning proposal for October's meeting. Later, Sandy discovered he erred and the issue will go before the zoning board Oct. 10.
