Waste Management Inc. has filed the formal application to put a Will County-owned landfill on former Joliet Arsenal property near Wilmington, setting in motion a process aimed at opening the dump by fall 2000.
The five-volume, 20-inch-high document was filed late last week with the county clerk’s office, just inside a deadline that had been extended twice.
The filing came eight months behind schedule, but county officials insisted that the delay would not necessarily postpone the landfill opening.
“We never felt that there were any fixed deadlines, except those imposed on us by elected officials or members of the press,” said Bruce Friefeld, an aide to County Executive Charles Adelman. “The important thing is getting it right.”
Adelman twice granted extensions on the deadline for filing the documents.
Within 40 days, the Will County Board must name three of its members to sit as a pollution control facility commission and must schedule a public hearing on the landfill project. Within 180 days, the board must approve or deny the application for a landfill, from which it stands to make millions of dollars.
Board approval would send the application to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency for its approval.
Dean Olson, the county’s waste services director, said the filing was slowed by several factors, including the recent acquisition of Oak Brook-based Waste Management by Houston-based USA Waste Services Inc., which then took Waste Management’s name.
Bruce Malic, Waste Management’s vice president and general manager for Illinois operations, said he still expects the landfill to be opened by September 2000.
