The following history was derived from reviewing county records, minutes of Board meetings, and court documents. There is much rumor and misinformation being passed through the streets about what happened during the Landfill Times of Page County. This is the historical record, as described in the Minute Books.
This story is presented here because many of the same names are up for election. Click on the names the first time they appear to see their current vision statement and platform.
1987 – 1992. Picture a quiet community. Many of the names we have in place today, are also names back in that period. Charlie Campbell was there. Ron Wilson. Raymond Kite. Board meetings have people attending, and making comments. What do you hear? State of Virginia suggests, offers a grant, study a “regional solid waste management plan”. Idea is: one community builds a landfill, and surrounding communities contract to use that one, rather than build their own. Much like the Regional Jail plan. Page County Board of Supervisors says, Maybe that should be us. Sounding familiar yet?
1988 – Board is hearing requests for capital equipment expenditures at the landfill, which is in Stanley. Hiring employees. Fixing trucks. Figuring out how to open the Springfield Compactor site, and talking about compactor sites all over the county, one for each district.
And then in December of 1988, they’re being told the Stanley landfill only has five years left to operate, and they’re going to need to close that one, and spend millions to open a new one. They decide to commission a “study”, and they ask Julian Sedwick to look into this.
1989 – this is the groundwork for what ends up happening, so this is important. What happens in these early days plays out over twenty years and since the landfill is still bleeding, perhaps over forty years, if we don’t pay attention.
1989—Joyce Engineering is commissioned to do a study of whether the regional landfill can be located here.
June, 1989 - additional land over at Battlecreek area is purchased, just in case. August, 1989, more land purchased just in case.
November, 1989 – County Board of Supervisors adopts the state of Virginia’s proposal for the “Regional Solid Waste Management Plan: 2010” and the idea of that concept is the idea adopted by hundreds of small communities in the U.S. – the regional landfill is meant to be a money making business, which will GENERATE tax revenue and pay for the schools, because that’s what a landfill business IS.
So in 1989, Page County does what hundreds of other counties did, and tries to do something progressive and positive for its citizens. As suggested and outlined by the State of Virginia.
No nefarious intent. No boogeyman. No corruption. Just regular people, trying to do the right thing. There is a book being circulated that says this was about Mafia and payoffs. There is an Internet website that charges that Marvin Bush was part of the plot to defraud the people of Page County. The book charges that these payoffs were never prosecuted because the state Commonwealth Attorney, Attorney General, and Governor were in on it. Like a “CLICK”. But the charges were investigated, and found to be invalid. Sometimes business transactions can “look” like something they are not. Sometimes Grand Juries are convened that result in no indictments. Here’s a little info about the investor.
http://rebellenation.blogspot.com/2006/08/bush-cartel-finances-senate-report.html
It takes until 1993 before this act is actually implemented with a contract. So you see a Board action can take five years to even happen, so that’s a data point, one to look for as we continue. Businesses who set up to do things like this routinely set up “new” companies for each activity. What looked like a “new” company was not necessarily so.
1991, Triad Engineering is hired to analyze whether Battle Creek will be an appropriate place for this regional landfill site. Apparently they thought it was, because apparently they looked at the site, and not the road leading up to the site, and they didn’t think about the impact of hundreds of 18 wheeler tractor trailers coming across 211. So that’s another datapoint. When you hire a consultant, you have to remember that the consultant is going to answer the question you ASK, not the common sense you shouldn’t NEED to ask.
June, 1992. Members of the Board are Nora Belle Comer, Allen Louderback, Leon Rickard, Robert Good, and Raymond Kite. Note that Allen Cubbage is NOT on the Board. Charlie Campbell is Commissioner of Revenue. Ron Wilson is around doing something. The decision to enter into this regional landfill plan was made FOUR YEARS AGO. The Stanley landfill is supposed to be closed soon. Warren County is saying they will sign a contract to use the regional landfill. Winchester is considering it. The Board decides to find a commercial operator to run this landfill, because it’s now going to be bigger and it needs professional management.
March, 1993, newly elected Chair Raymond Kite signs the contract with Tellurian, to operate the regional landfill, as outlined in the State of Virginia’s “Regional Solid Waste Management Plan: 2010”, and decided by the Board in 1989. No boogeyman. Just solid, regular people, trying to do what they think is best.
Except for one thing. This contract with Tellurian has a clause in it that says, “Put or Pay”. The county has agreed to PUT trash in this landfill to a certain level, or PAY the contractor the difference between the required level and what is actually put in. The landfill in Stanley is still being used, and now somehow the state is saying it’s okay to keep Stanley open, it doesn’t have to close down yet after all, and Tellurian starts operating the regional landfill in Stanley. This is a change. The state had previously told the county to shut it down.
Only, the local and regional trash isn’t enough to meet the standards of operating as a business, so Tellurian starts bringing in trash from New York. 1993 -- Trucks with tags from Maine and New Jersey start showing up in Stanley.
1994, citizens in Stanley are having meetings, basically “screaming bloody murder” about the trucks rolling in through Stanley, with all these out of state license plates on them. These are huge trucks, in a residential area. The County pushes on Tellurian to slow down with the out of state trucks, and as a result, the county is not meeting its “put or pay” clauses, and the taxpaying citizens of Page County are paying $70,000 a month to Tellurian because they’re not meeting their PUT obligations. This goes on for SIX YEARS.
1999, Battlecreek Landfill opens. Amid fanfare from the state that this is a “lined, state-of-the-art model facility.” It follows the state guidelines. It does what the state suggested. It’s a “Regional Waste Management Facility: 2010” Tellurian “put or pay” contract is still in effect. County is still paying. People in Stanley are settling down, because the trucks moved over to Battlecreek.
But you have to think about this annual cost of the regional landfill in the context of people’s property taxes. In those days, it’s costing about $28M total to run the county, with all its services. Most of that money comes from state and federal grants. Local Real estate property taxes are bringing in numbers that are in the ballpark of about $3.5 – 4M. At a loss of $70,000 a month, nearly 25% of people’s property taxes are being spent on the regional landfill. When it was supposed to be a money GENERATOR! It was entered into on the premise that it would be the funding vehicle for these new schools! So this is bad stuff! This bleeding has to be stopped. Not only is this landfill not paying for the new schools, it’s taking the money that we could have saved up for it.
Something has to be done. It’s not an illegal contract. Regardless of what was written on the Internet and in books, it’s a real contract, and it can’t be just disregarded. Something has to be done about it.
So in the year 2000, new people come on the Board of Supervisors, and they decide they have to fix it. Because they’re trying to do the right thing, to stop the bleeding, and to get the money back for the people of Page, so they can build schools. Besides, now that Battlecreek is open, the people of Stanley are not complaining any more, and it’s time to actually implement that vision from the state in the “Regional Solid Waste Management Plan: 2010”
In 2001, the Board figures they’ve got it right this time, and they go back to the original plan, which worked successfully in hundreds of other counties, and they decide to revise the contract with Tellurian, and let it bring more trucks in, increase the rate of dumping, and start to make money. This IS the concept of a regional landfill. It IS supposed to be a money making operation for the county, which adds to the county coffers, doesn’t take money out of it. It is envisioned to be a profit sharing deal, where yes, the contractor makes money, because why else would a contractor do it, and yes, the county also makes money, and uses that money to pay for schools. Writing books about how shocking it is that the “Mafia” operates landfill operations in the United States is like doing a study to conclude that pharmaceutical companies make outrageous profits. One should not be insulted that this revelation fails to get a prosecutor to act.
So in 2001, here is who is now on the Board:
Allen Cubbage is chair.
Nora Belle Comer, Gerald Cubbage, Elaine Mayberry, and Robert Good.
They’re trying to do the right thing and restore fiscal responsibility. They come up with something like 21 versions and iterations, trying to change this contract, and get us out of this disastrous trouble. Pressure comes from the Page News, which is running weekly articles about the losses, and on the other side, from an environmental group, carrying signs that say “no mega-landfill”. But we’re already in a contract for a mega-landfill. Which was decided in 1989, and signed in 1993. None of the existing supervisors were there when this contract was signed, but they are getting pressures from two sides – stop the financial losses on one side, and close the landfill completely, on the other side. The two sides can’t be reconciled, and there is a contract in place which can’t be broken. The environmental group starts bringing in people from outside Page County to help “protest.”
But even though this new landfill at BattleCreek is no longer in a residential area, as it was in Stanley, a group of citizens starts protesting. In Sept 2001, Gerald Cubbage introduces a motion on the Board. Gerald moves that the Planning Commission be given the task to develop a specific plan for the landfill, amend the Comprehensive Plan, publish notice, and give a public hearing before doing anything else.
Gerald’s motion is voted down 4 -1. All other supervisors except Gerald voted against it. Elaine Mayberry, Allen Cubbage, Nora Belle Comer, and Robert Good want to fix the bleeding, and get the operation back on track to make money. They want to fulfill the promise that counties all over the country have realized, to get an operating business that pays for the schools.
And in December, 2001, a new contract is signed, called a DFA, allowing the contractor, who changed names and financial backers at this point, to bring in enough trash so that the landfill can be profitable. This is where Marvin Bush and Winston Partners comes in. Here is their website. http://www.winstonpartners.com/team.html
The Board contracts “The Davenport Study” to examine the financials, and make a plan to get those schools. A “big” tax increase, which later turns out to be small compared to the tax increase of 2007, is put in place to recover what has been lost to date, but a serious plan to keep this from continuing is enacted.
In 2002, the trucks start to roll. Elaine Mayberry is Chair in 2002 and 2003. Minutes of the Board meetings show Elaine demanding accountability at that landfill. Where are the checks? Where are the records? You see her in the minutes, insisting on numbers, documents, and accounting. Assigning people to go look at what is going on. Supervisors personally go over to the landfill and count trucks.
Many of today’s political names are in the room. Charlie Campbell is there. Ron Wilson is there. C R Suddith is there. Allen Cubbage is there. Gerald Cubbage is there. They are all looking for accountability, and all concerned about what is going on. Gerald consistently votes against the landfill actions, wanting to get it back into county control. Everybody else is hysterically trying to stop the bleeding by getting more money IN.
But, they are also fixing the animal shelter, paying the cougar bounties, and doing all the mundane tasks we expect from our Board.
The computer system – the one we just last week needed another $75,000 for a new AS/400 for, doesn’t integrate with the new computer system the new contractor at the landfill put in. We can’t get the records so easily. We can’t follow what is happening.
But, we start to make money. We start filling the coffers, and we start saving up the money for the new schools. The county keeps trying to change the contract, little by little, putting profit sharing arrangements in the deal. The Davenport Study seems to be working. The state is considering changing the permit to allow 750 tons a day.
But more than 750 tons a day are coming in, because the landfill operators intend to make a profit. No surprise there. No need to call in the cops about that. It’s a business.
Now here is the KEY event: In August, 2002, in opposition to the landfill operation, which was now making money, 4,800 people signed a petition to close the landfill. They should have been Page County residents.
There are only 10,500 people that come out to vote, so if these were Page County residents, close to HALF of them signed that petition. Why? Their own money was being used to support the landfill before. Now the landfill is starting to pay. But NOW the petition gets taken to Richmond.
If those were Page County residents, that means nearly one out of every TWO people who vote in Page County signed it. Did you sign it? Did your spouse sign it? Did your neighbor sign it? If half the people who vote that you know, didn’t sign it, somebody brought people from outside Page County to sign it.
The petition is taken to Richmond, one of three citizen petitions taken there, and the DEQ is asked to get involved.
Mid-2003, DEQ starts telling the Board they are going to revoke the permit. They show the Board operating violations done by the contractor. The contractor shrugs it off, primarily because that’s SOP for landfills, and the DEQ is usually too busy to get to everything everywhere, so they’re not worried.
November, 2003. Election. Everybody on the current Board of Supervisors either decides not to run again, or is voted out of office, EXCEPT Gerald Cubbage, who consistently voted against the landfill operations. A new Board comes in.
December 2003, Dwight Matthew Sours was killed in a truck accident on 211, tragic accident that citizens felt was inexcusable, and blamed on the predictable outcome of excessive truck traffic on that road. Now the fate of the landfill is completely sealed. If those weren’t all Page County residents who signed that petition, they will be now. This is the final turn for anti-landfill sentiment.
2004. The new Board: Chair Gerald Cubbage, Mason Lockridge, Carol Lee Strickler, Charlie Hoke, Charles Ballard. Close to what we have now.
March, 2004, the state revokes Page County’s permit to operate a landfill. The contractor goes bankrupt. The contractor SUES Page County AND THE BOARD OF SUPERVISORS AS INDIVIDUALS for $34M. These people just got elected! They were the innocent bystanders!
Why did that happen? Some would say it happened because the citizen protestors brought DEQ into the picture, when DEQ would probably not have gotten around to it otherwise. This caused the contractor’s bankruptcy, and resulted in the lawsuit. Some say there was corruption, illegal actions, payoffs, looking the other way on the part of prosecutors. But nothing illegal happened here. The charges and accusations were invalid, grand juries were convened and dropped. Why? Because the charges weren’t true. Sometimes that happens. Grand juries CAN be convened and conclude that the charges are not valid. It happened this time, and it can happen again.
May, 2004, Gerald Cubbage signed an interim agreement to get the suit settled, and in January 2005, a court ordered settlement was signed by Mason Lockridge.
The terms of the settlement were:
· The county paid $8.3M and got the landfill back to operate on its own. It cost another $5 -6 M to get it operating up to DEQ standards. So the taxpayers have a debt of about $14M at a rate of about 4.5% interest.
· The county has to operate that landfill for three years, and if it makes money from that operation, much of the money goes to the financer who lost out in bankruptcy court.
· There is a reference in there to the Ballard Settlement. I haven’t found out the details of the Ballard Settlement YET, but if anybody out there knows, the email address to tell me is Research@PageCountyWatch.org . Part of the agreement is that the financer Capital Sources, will withdraw its objection to the Ballard Settlement if this payment of $8.3M is made. For some reason, Capital Sources objected to that settlement.
So we have to keep the landfill open until June 2008, by this agreement, and we have to try to make it make money, so we can pay back the debt, but if it doesn’t make money, that’s okay too.
Why is all this important? Because there still is a decision to make about that landfill, at least in 2008. It still costs money to the taxpayers. How much money? A call to the county offices will get you the numbers: $400,000 in operating expenses, plus $518,000 in debt service, not counting the $1.2M that was just added to the capital expense, plus unknown numbers for legal costs, the contract liability insurance we now buy for our Board of Supervisors in case they ever get sued personally again.
Serious money. Example of a simple decision, made in 1989, and how it impacted the county for years and years.
Here’s the thing:
From 2000 – 2003, it cost about $35M to $37M a year to run this county. This was the time when a Financial Manager was in place, and the plan was to get the landfill to pay for the schools. Then things changed.
2004 - $40M
2005 - $44M
2006 - $58M -- A $14M rise in operating costs when our current Board of Supervisors was elected.
2007 - $65M PLUS the debt for the schools and the landfill, and more to come next year, as the rest of the Capital Improvement Plan is put in place.
We went from an operating budget of $37M to $65M in 4 years, not counting the schools! Not counting the new county office building, improvements to the jail, and county “complex” of buildings!
We don’t have that many taxpayers, and we didn’t get many MORE in the last 4 years, because we don’t have a growing population. Our population is LOSING young people, and gaining old people.
It is VERY important what happens to our tax money, because as more retired people move here – and who else can live here because trucks can’t come in, and if you can’t bring in trucks, how can you bring in business?
So that’s why we have to understand the context and the history of who we are. Because things that work for hundreds of other counties, don’t work for us. And we have to know that.
The moral of this story? We have part-time Supervisors spending our tax money, running our county. They do it after their regular jobs, in the evenings. It takes more than that. We, as taxpayers, have to pay attention to what they are doing. Show up at those Board meetings. And WATCH.
This history of the landfill was researched, prepared, and posted by Page County Watch.
September, 2007
