The Environment Court has set dates for the hearing of appeals against a proposed landfill in the Dome Valley.
The hearings concerning Waste Management’s proposal for a new Auckland Regional Landfill will start on June 20, next year. It will take nine weeks with sequential breaks and run over five months.
Appeals to the Environment Court were triggered when commissioners voted four to one to grant a resource consent for the landfill back in June.
Among those appealing are anti-landfill group Fight the Tip, the Director-General of Conservation, Forest and Bird and several iwi groups.
Fight the Tip campaigner Sue Crockett says now the court dates have been confirmed, Fight the Tip’s lawyer Andrew Braggins can begin confirming witnesses and preparing a programme to fight the case.
“We are all in good heart and just have to keep ourselves in there,” she says.
Ms Crockett says Fight the Tip has applied to the Ministry of the Environment for a $50,000 grant to help with legal expenses and hopes to hear if the application has been successful before Christmas.
She says in the meantime, generous community donations have ensured Fight the Tip has enough funding to cover its costs for at least the early stages of legal proceedings.
Donations to Fight the Tip can be made at https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/fightthetip or direct into Fight the Tip Tiaki Te Whenua Inc’s bank, account number – 12 3094 0274048 00
Meanwhile, Waste Management says that in addition to preparing evidence for the hearings, it is continuing its efforts to engage with iwi and community groups.
“One of our ongoing goals is to help people understand the realities of modern, engineered landfills, and how they are nothing like the legacy “dumps” of the past,” Waste Management said in a statement.
