The Board of Selectmen (BOS) approved funding for a new soil disposal program to remove contaminated material from Guilford to a specialized facility in Portland, Connecticut. According to town officials, the current plan is to remove the stored soil from its current site at the end of Sullivan Drive for remediation to the third-party reclamation company, Red Technologies.

According to town officials, for many years, the town has accumulated soil and dirt removed during the post-winter cleaning process at Guilford’s Brush and Leaf Facility on Sullivan Drive, known locally as the “stump dump,” despite the fact it does not accept stumps. Containing mostly sand from winter de-icing efforts, and though the material is considered to have a low level of infused pollutants, it is still deemed “contaminated” by the State DEEP.

The soil and matter removed from the town’s catch basins, when deemed contaminated, must be stored and remediated under strict guidelines. According to Town Engineer Janice Plaziak, the soil that town employees remove every year from the drains and basins contains salt, sand, road detritus, and smaller levels of oil and other vehicle-specific fluids that end up deposited on roadways.

Plaziak said the amount of accumulated matter needed to be addressed.

“We’ve been stockpiling all of the catch basin cleanings and street sweepings, and they have just been piling up at the brush and leaf facility, so we needed to come up with a plan to either be able to reuse or to dispose of it properly,” said Plaziak. “It’s not just the salt content; it is also other contaminants from road use like oil,” said Plaziak.

According to Plaziak, initial plans considered the reuse of the material, but the town simply did not have the facility or funding to remediate the soil.

“We don’t have any real use for the matter at this point in time. That’s not to say we won’t have some use for it in the future, but right now, we want to start trying to come up with a plan of testing. If we can use it for something, we will, or if we can sell to other contractors, we will, but right now, the piles we tested did not show they could be easily reused, so they would have a lot of restrictions. The best plan is to remove the material to a facility that can take contaminated soils,” Plaziak said.

First Selectman Matt Hoey said the town has accumulated roughly 300 cubic yards of stored material, which is the plan’s focus. He praised Plaziak and Public Works Director Dave Castro for their efforts in implementing the program.

“This is a project we’ve been looking to do for a while. The challenge to this point was that we didn’t know if these materials were contaminated, and therefore we couldn’t allow anyone to take these materials until that level was determined. These spoils are coming out of the catch basins and are continuing to grow and grow,” said Hoey. “This is a great opportunity to address this situation, and I applaud Dave Castro (Public Works Director) and Janice Plaziak for having developed this plan to diminish or eliminate that particular stockpile. We are continuing to add to that pile as we continue to clean the catch basins, but the good news is, the amount of matter going in will be drastically reduced as we are no longer using sand for de-icing and using salt instead.”

Hoey added that hauling costs will be kept to a minimum via use of town vehicles.

“Once again, Dave Castro is showing his capacity to save taxpayer money. We will be using our employees and our vehicles to truck the soil to the facility, so we won’t be incurring freight charges,” said Hoey.

According to Hoey, Castro had already implemented a program upon his hiring last year, of curtailing the town’s sanding program entirely and utilizing salt instead.

Castro said the move away from sand has several cost-saving features, including fewer man-hours for basin cleaning, wear and tear on town equipment, and elimination of sand purchasing costs.

Plaziak said her department has been seeking options and is confident that the current plan will address both short-term and long-term concerns.

“We’ve been talking about this for a couple of years. The key was really to get this testing done to know whether the material was clean or not…and how to properly handle that,” said Plaziak. “We were able to get some funding together this past year and do a little bit of testing with our environmental professional we are working with, and they helped us with the plan as to where it would need to go for proper disposal. And we have funding now to deal with it, and that is helpful.”

Plaziak added, “The good news is that we are no longer going to be using sand in our winter operations for snow and ice treatment. We’re switched over to entirely salt now, so going forward, we hope to be producing less material that will come from the catch basin cleanings,” said Plaziak. “We still have quite a bit to remove and work through, but at least we have the process started. Based on the cost…we’re estimating about 300-400 cubic yards of material for disposal that we’ll be able to handle with the budget we have now.”

According to Hoey and Plaziak, the program is another example of the town’s efforts to save money and ensure Guilford’s long-standing environmental commitment.

“At this point now, we really just don’t have the room to continue stockpiling this material, quite frankly. We don’t have endless space to keep stockpiling this type of material,” said Plaziak. “Going forward, we’re hoping to be more proactive and have a use for it, and if not a use, a budget to properly dispose of it.”

The allotted funds should cover the removal of the entire stored pile of soil, and considering the lack of additional sand being utilized, future costs will be minimal regarding disposal, according to officials. The estimate for removing the current accumulated material is five years, according to Castro.

Residents should note that the brush and leaf facility on the Sullivan Drive site permits residents and Guilford businesses to take wood chips/mulch from the site at their convenience. No appointment or permission is needed; the site is only open on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. weather permitting.