In Saratoga Springs, the landfill runneth over

The city may be on the hook to clean up a developer’s vacant Weibel Avenue property after preparatory work for a project planned there revealed the site may be leaking methane and contain garbage from the decommissioned city landfill next door.

The city owned the land but sold it at auction in 2002. Now, its new owner — Tara Stone — has put on hold a plan to build a roughly 20,000-square-foot retail building on the 0.34-acre site after high levels of methane were discovered in the soil during tests.

Public Works Commissioner Anthony “Skip” Scirocco said a study is now underway to determine whether the city landfill or its cap encroached on the land. Also, he said the city needs to determine whether garbage found buried on the site came from the landfill before it was decommissioned during the 1990s.

“There is garbage in the middle of the property,” he said. “We found it eight or 10 feet down. The question is, who is going to be responsible for the cleanup?”

City employees contacted the state Department of Environmental Conservation last month to alert it that a portion of the capped landfill appeared to be located on Stone’s property. The agency is now working with the city to determine how far the capped landfill extends onto the property, and how much uncapped trash is buried there, said Dave Winchell, a regional DEC spokesman.

“The information the city will gather from the field investigations will allow DEC and the city to determine the source of the methane gas and how best to address it,” he said in an email.

The city sold the land to John Stark for $21,000 in July 2002, according to property records. Stark held onto the property until September 2013, when Stone purchased it from him for $220,000.

Scirocco said the city should have never sold the property, given its proximity to the landfill. He believes a “membrane” from the capped landfill crosses the property line and that the property even had an old monitoring well on it.

“When you look at the map and you look at the property line, it’s pretty clear [the landfill] is encroaching,” he said. “Is it going to be another cost [for the city]? Yes.”

Stone has retained Glens Falls attorney John Lapper, who said he’s awaiting additional test results from the property before deciding how to proceed. If the tests determine the contamination on the property is a result of the landfill, he said, the city will need to address the matter.

“The bottom line is if it’s on Tara’s property they’re going to have to clean it up,” he said.

For a time, the capped landfill produced enough methane to power the Weibel Avenue ice rink nearby. But the cogeneration system burning the gas started to develop problems in 2003 and eventually was mothballed in 2009.

Since that time, methane has continued to seep from the site, since it is no longer being collected and burned. In addition, the two-decade-old collection system itself is in disrepair, causing concerns the methane could start migrating underground.

Improvements to the system are underway and expected to be completed in spring. A flare will be installed to burn the collected gas.

Scirocco pointed some of the blame at his predecessor as public works commissioner, Thomas McTygue, saying McTygue should have at least stopped the city from selling the land.

“He had to know what was going on at the landfill,” Scirocco said. “That was his responsibility.”

McTygue, however, said he had nothing to do with the sale and that the city Accounts Department handled it. He said gases may be migrating from the landfill and some garbage might have spilled over years ago, but he doesn’t believe the city ever used the property for dumping.

“That piece of property was never part of the landfill,” he said.

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