In 2018, the Associated Press brought us this horrible tale of a small Alabama town suffering from a train full of what can only be called 10 million pounds of northern aggression—a sludge-hauling train full of solid human waste from New York and New Jersey. The train was left to sit in the ’Bama heat for months due to zoning issues, poisoning the tiny town of Parrish, Alabama. That train moved on once the AP report came out and the company responsible, Big Sky Environmental, pinky swore it was out of inter-state shit game for good.
New documents revealed by WVTM 13, however, shows Big Sky Environmental is back in the brown. Though residents, like David Brasfield, doubted the company would willingly give up on steaming piles of gold:
On Feb. 1, an inspector with the state Department of Environmental Management found a newly constructed rail spur at the landfill. They also noted eight empty rail cars. According to the inspector’s report, Jonathan Click, the vice president of operations at Big Sky, said the cars had been unloaded in the last two weeks.
Other documents filed by the Alabama Department of Environmental Management show that since November, at least three wastewater facilities in New York and New Jersey have received permission to dump waste at Big Sky Environmental in the landfill.
Brasfield said he feels like the nightmare they experienced a few years back is happening again.
“This is a community I’ve lived in 50 years and I want to be able to stay here, but people don’t realize the odor, the scent, the flies,” Brasfield said.
Small rural towns are often used as dumping spots for big city trash, and the poop train really highlighted the dirty practice. It was such a transfixing story of this tiny town suffering under the weight of big city feces that Vice News went out and spoke to residents for this heartbreaking story:
The Alabama Department of Environmental Management confirmed that human waste would be rolling through this Alabama community once again and it assured residents that the problems of 2018 won’t reoccur:
ADEM will continue to conduct unannounced inspections (at least quarterly) at the site and will use enforcement tools, when necessary, to compel compliance. Please remember, last time this was an issue, the railcars were stacked up at off-site rail spurs which were outside of ADEM’s purview. This time, the rail yard is on-site and as such is subject to the requirements of their solid waste disposal permit.
Gee, that would totally be reassuring to the communities around the landfill, if Big Sky Environmental weren’t already in violation of the ADEM’s rules after the company built an unauthorized railroad spur and used the rail yard even though that was not included in their waste treatment permit.
Sounds like the same old shit to me.