SIX NATIONS — Six Nations resident Earl Johnson of Third Line Road, has what he believes to be a solution for the overburdened and highly polluted Fourth Line community dump site which stands like a mountain abutting the rear of his land.
He became the centre of controversy recently when members of the Men’s Fire stopped the train of dump trucks leading to his Third Line property.
At the time, Johnson agreed to stop the deliveries until the misunderstanding is resolved. He also chose not to speak to the media until this week to explain his plan for a recycle business and why he believes it is needed.
“I believe I have the solution for the dump,” he told Two Row Times. “I intend to join forces with Bill (Warner) from A&W Recycling and build a large recycling facility here on this side.”
The current facility for A&W is too small and they can’t handle everything at that location, which on the dump site itself.
“The reason why I brought in the dirt is because I need a berm all the way around to protect against the wind blowing papers and junk all over the place and onto my neighbours’ land,” he explains. “All my life I guess I was misinformed about what you can do on your land. I was always told that this is my land and I can do what I want on it as long as it doesn’t interfere with my neighbours. That’s why I just went ahead and did it. But now that I know better, I am out to fix everything and go through the proper channels.”
Johnson is scheduled to present his business plan to the Elected Council on December 15th and to make it right with the people.
“The dump is just getting bigger and bigger every day and polluting my land and that of others through leaching from the unprotected mountains of garbage next to my property,” he says. “That dump has no gas wells in it, and it’s almost like a methane time bomb.”
“It is my property that they have destroyed by not caring about our people,” he said. Johnson’s plan is to have a proper weight scales and enough acreage to handle and sort all kinds of waste materials for recycling with his new partners from A&W Recyclers.
He says there will be no fee to use his new facility and plans to employ a sizable staff, making his money from selling the recyclables. Regarding reports of toxic waste mulched in with the soil he is receiving, Johnson says nothing could be further from the truth and insists there is no restricted or hazardous waste mixed with the soil he has been bringing in to date.
He says his suppliers of the soil have all been approved by Environment Canada with papers to prove it is safe and contains no asbestos or other toxins.
“I told the guy I am dealing with that if there is any contamination in any of that soil, I do not want it,” he says. But why the mulch in the soil?
Johnson says there is nothing sinister about what he is doing and says, “The reason for the mulch is to absorb a large swampy area between my property and that of the dump, which has turned into a small lake of stinky black water before I put gravel over it.”
He claims to have the support of other businesses to work with him on the large-scale project.
At the rear of his property is a stand of Carolinian forest, which is dying due to the pollution in the soil from the dump.
There is a government ditch which crosses his land, which he believes is also polluted due to the dump.
Johnson is concerned over what he believes has been a “misunderstanding” and miscommunication between himself and the Men’s Fire who stopped the delivery of soil to Johnson’s land believing it to contain contaminants.
