“A Manhattan attorney representing Seneca Meadows Inc. landfill has demanded that Seneca Lake Guardian, a local non-profit environmental group, remove “false and defamatory statements” about SMI from its website.
SLG founders Joseph Campbell and Yvonne Taylor refused to do so and said they would not be bullied into silence by the state’s largest landfill.
They have been actively opposing SMI’s bid to win a state permit to expand and remain in business long after 2025, the mandatory closing date under a Seneca Falls town law.
“Our attorney’s legal opinion is that we aren’t making any false or defamatory statements,” Campbell said.
After a virtual press conference today, Taylor released the landfill’s Nov. 18 letter warning them to “cease and desist” making further “false statements.” She also released a Dec. 7 reply letter from SLG’s own attorney.
Cease and desist letters are often sent as a prelude to formal legal action, but SMI has not yet taken its grievances to court.
“The central theme of your client’s claim,” Gitlen wrote Murphy, “seems to be that because NYSDEC has issued operating permits for the landfill, it cannot be the source of unacceptable adverse environmental impacts.”
“If a NYSDEC permit means that there will be no unacceptable (indeed, disastrous) adverse environmental impacts,” Gitlen continued, “there would have been no PCBs in the Hudson River and … (carcinogenic PFAS chemicals) wouldn’t have been in the Village of Hoosick Falls water supply.” “
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Mantius, Peter. FingerLakes.com