Dredge Material Storage Riles Cape Mining’s Neighbors

COURT HOUSE – Middle Township Committee held a hearing July 16 to determine whether the municipality would grant two permits to Cape Mining and Recycling.
Those permits would allow the mining and excavation company to transport, store, process and recycle dredge soils (the latest favored term for dredge material) at its site on Goshen Road in Court House. 
Many neighbors of the company’s location turned out to speak against the application for the permits.
Rocco Tedesco, an attorney for Cape Mining, presented the application. He walked company officials through a series of prepared questions.
The company’s argument began with the importance of dredging in and to coastal communities. Tedesco noted that one of the most significant hurdles in the federal and state permit process that allows coastal communities to dredge their back bay areas is the need for a preapproved location for the dredge materials after they are dewatered.
Testimony emphasized the “comprehensive oversight” of the process by the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), including testing and grading the soils.
Tedesco said that the immediate issue was the removal of soils from a dredging operation in Ocean City and that the dredge material has been determined to be “residential quality,” meaning that they are non-toxic and can be used for a variety of applications, including residential and agricultural application, once they have been properly processed for recycling at the company’s location.
Tedesco asked the rhetorical question “What better location for the dredge material than a resources extraction site? This is what they do.”
Township Engineer Vincent Orlando reviewed the company’s application and proposed that any permit would carry the requirement of a yearly inspection by the township. He otherwise presented no substantial objection to the application.
What Storage Means
According to company estimates, the maximum capacity the Goshen Road site can absorb is 270,000 cubic yards of dredge soils. That is enough to create a pile 35 feet higher than current levels over an area designated for dredge material storage.
The Ocean City dredging is expected to produce as much as 600,000 cubic yards of material.
In order for Cape Mining to continue to absorb dredge soils after it reaches capacity, the soils would need to be blended and sold for applications such as marsh restoration, recreation field cover or agricultural soil build-up.
The operation required to move hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of dredge material in and out of the site would be accommodated through the use of many trucks.
Company estimates were that as many as 75 trucks a day might be involved in transporting material to the site. For the most part, the trucks would use county roads which are supposed to be able to handle, weight-wise, what township roads could not.
Cape Mining has another site for dredge soil storage in Erma. That site is currently at capacity and cannot continue to accept material according to a company official, Phil Hughes.
Some mention was made of two DEP violations at the Erma site that forced a suspension of operations. Tedesco said that the violations had to do with storage and reporting requirements and did not involve any question of the acceptable nature of the material.
No township officials pressed for details on the violations which did not appear to present obstacles to the company’s application for permits.
Neighbors’ Concerns
Once the hearing was open for public comment, neighbors of the site presented a list of concerns.
Leading that list was the issue of noise pollution. As many as 75 trucks a day rumbling through their nearby roads, a continuous cacophony of warning beeps from backup sensors on the trucks, and noise from grinder and blender equipment used to prepare the material for recycling all add up to a loss of peace and quiet for those living near the site or on the route to or from the site.
The material brought into the location will have already been dewatered, but it can still contain as much as 40 percent water according to company comments at the hearing.
Neighbors also objected to the olfactory pollution they expect from the still wet soils piled as much as 35 feet high. For reference, the average utility pole is about 40 feet.
The company tried its best to assure residents that odors are a problem at the dewatering location off site, but should not impact neighborhoods surrounding the storage location.
They also promised appropriate landscaping to block the line of sight with regard to the large mounds of material that will exist prior to recycling.
Neighbor, Andrew Smith, raised concern about leakage into nearby wells, a concern the company dismissed as not a danger.
George Daily, of Timothy Lane, raised a concern of a potential impact on property values.
Potential damage to roads, cleanup of “soil dripping” from still wet material being trucked to the site, the need for trucks to cross the nearby bike path, the expected inundation of pools and decks with blown debris, all took their turn as objections to the permit.
In the end, committee tabled official action, knowing that a decision must be made soon in order for the permit process in Ocean City to move forward.
The options are limited. The township can deny the permits, but the legal basis for doing so may be tenuous.
If the township grants the permits, the committee can place restrictions on hours of the day when materials can be received or take similar steps to reduce noise problems.
Since any permit to use the site for dredge soils would not be limited to the specific material from Ocean City, township action must contain any desired constraints on the site as a permanent location for dredge material.
To contact Vince Conti, email vconti@cmcherald.com.