After over 3.5 hours of oral arguments in the court room, the judge decided to postpone the final decision until sometime after March 1st. There will be another hearing at that time, and the public is invited to attend again as well.
A lot was said, and ultimately it’s extremely disappointing and disheartening that DEQ is fighting so hard against us, the public, to NOT do their job, to protect the public and our environment. Pacific Steel had their own attorney as well, and he sat at the table with the 2 DEQ attorneys, so 3 attorneys against our one. John Meyer from Cottonwood Environmental Law Center represented us and did a kick ass job. Not a single person from DEQ or Pacific Steel, besides their attorneys were there (that we saw). On the contrary, the public area was filled with people wearing yellow representing our protest to the landfill.
DEQ is standing on the basis that they did everything required to properly permit this project, and an Environmental Impact Statement/Study (EIS) is not required. The Pacific lawyer was sure to tell the judge what she could and couldn’t do in this case, and an EIS would take 5-10 years and millions of dollars. John Meyer came back and said, that’s part of protecting our environment from the first ever ASR landfill in the country, and it contains toxic chemicals including PFAS. The judge got a lot of information over the 3.5 hours of lawyers rebutting and arguing. And ultimately she decided to wait to get the transcript from this hearing and summary from the lawyers, and then make a decision March 1st. It’s in our favor she didn’t rule right away because I think it was information overload and there was still some confusion about the project itself.
DEQ’s mission statement: “Our mission is to champion a healthy environment for a thriving Montana.” Also from DEQ’s webpage, “Montana DEQ is here to serve you and to ensure Montanans have clean air, water, and land free from contamination….DEQ protects Montana’s environment and promotes a healthy and thriving way of life for all Montanans – as reflected in the Agency’s mission statement.”
Yet DEQ refuses to ensure containment of PFAS containing dust particles at the landfill, refuses to monitor the landfill forever post closure (only 30 years), refuses to take a hard look at the environmental impacts of this landfill, and much more.
From our final reply brief, “The Montana Department of Environmental Quality (“DEQ”) violated the Montana Constitution and Montana Environmental Policy Act (“MEPA”) by failing to take a “hard look” at the potential environmental impacts of the proposed Shepherd landfill. The DEQ’s own internal documents say landfills are a “major source of PFAS” pollution and exposure to the “toxic” forever chemicals can cause adverse human health effects, such as cancer. The DEQ violated MEPA and the Montana Constitution by failing to analyze or disclose this information in its MEPA analysis.”
More information and updates will be coming! Check out our interview with Q2 here, briefly discussing today’s hearing. A huge shoutout to those of you who showed your support in person and came to the hearing. We had about 35 people in the court room wearing yellow ribbons and yellow shirts. We will send out notifications when we get the final hearing date and location. Sign up for our email list to make sure you're in the know!
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