Riverhead Town has issued a new stop-work order to the Nassau County waste processor that’s been dumping yard wastes on a site of Youngs Avenue in Calverton.
The stop-work order, issued today, states that the property owner is in violation of chapters 301 and 229 of the Riverhead Town Code for the alleged “use of the property as a storage facility for mulch/yard waste with no active farming being done.”
The Town on April 24 issued a use permit to the property owner for a tree farm. Any composting on the site was required to be used for the “agricultural operation,” according to the permit, which was issued by the town building inspector.
“When they submitted their plan to get the use permit, active farming was indicated,” Riverhead Town Attorney Erik Howard said in a phone interview this afternoon. “The plan indicated the location of piles of material and the location of active farmland,” he said.
“Code enforcement was able to gain access to the site on Friday and observed that there was no evidence of any farming or preparation for it,” Howard said. “I conferenced with code enforcement and the planning department today and our assessment is the site is not engaged actively in agricultural production,” he said. “So the importation of material is a violation.”
RiverheadLOCAL reported on the current condition of the site and activities there Friday afternoon: From trees to trash? Odors, complaints follow composting move to Calverton (June 20)
Howard said that the lack of an active farm use at the site means the importation of materials for composting is not an accessory use to agriculture. Rather, he said, “it’s a primary use and a violation of Town Code Chapter] 301.” Chapter 301 is the town’s zoning code.
The 45-acre site, formerly part of the Warner Nursery tree farm, is located in the Agricultural Protection Zoning Use District, where storing and composting organic materials is an accessory “farm operation” that is “customarily incidental” to the permitted use of “agricultural production,” the town attorney said.
Howard said the town will be sending out a revocation of the use permit issued in April.
If the property owner commences agricultural activity, it can reapply for a use permit, he said.
The Youngs Avenue property is owned by a limited liability company that is owned by Joseph Defigueroa, who is also the owner of Patriot Recycling, a DEC-permitted waste facility in Oceanside. He bought the property last July and soon after taking title, Patriot Recycling began dumping grass clippings and other yard wastes at the site. The town issued a stop-work order on Aug. 8, citing the “dumping of material with garbage and other solid waste material.”
A town code enforcement officer had observed plastic mixed in with the materials, according to documents on file with the town.
According to a State Department of Environmental Conservation inspection report from Aug. 21, obtained through a Freedom of Information Law request by Jamesport resident Barbara Blass and shared with RiverheadLOCAL, odor control difficulties at the Oceanside site are what prompted the facility’s owner to relocate its “yard trimmings and soil operations” to Calverton.
The DeFigueroa company that owns the Calverton site applied for a use permit for a tree farm in February. After the permit was issued in April, the stop-work order was lifted and Patriot Recycling once again began bringing truckloads of materials to the site.
Neighboring residents attended the June 17 Town Board meeting to complain about odors generated by the operation and the volume of truck traffic. Some neighbors have circulated a petition, gathering more than 100 signatures asking the Town Board to stop the activity.
DeFigueroa’s attorney, Steven Losquadro of Rocky Point, could not be reached for comment this afternoon.
Patriot Recycling has been dumping about six truckloads there daily from Monday through Saturday, according to Youngs Avenue resident Bob Hering, whose 6 ½-acre farm is surrounded on two sides by the DeFigueroa site.
With the heat wave, the odor has been unbearable, Hering said today.
He was happy to see the bright pink stop-work order posted on the fence at the entrance to the property some time today, he said. Hering sent a photo of the sign to RiverheadLOCAL this afternoon. He said the town should require “all that crap” to be removed from the property.
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