http://riverfronttimes.com/2008-01-16/news/sacred-garbage/

Sacred Garbage?
Native Americans trash plans to expand a sprawling Illinois landfill.

By Keegan Hamilton
Published: January 16, 2008

Kathy Andria steers her white Geo sedan down the gravel road that skirts
the Milam Landfill in south Madison County. She pulls up next to a couple
who are hunched behind a camera aimed at the swampy marsh near the
sprawling dump. "Birds," the man says, explaining what they're
photographing, "Canada geese, mostly." Andria cranes her neck, hoping to
catch a glimpse of the wildlife, but only sees a flock of crows circling
the landfill's towering heap of trash. She shakes her head.

Andria, the president of the Illinois-based environmental group American
Bottom Conservancy, has spent nearly two years battling Milam's expansion,
which will replace the existing dump (just north of I-55/70, bordering
Madison and Fairmont City). Having recently topped 170 feet in height and
dwarfing the largest of the neighboring Cahokia Mounds, the current fill is
expected to reach capacity in five years. If approved, the expansion will
occupy an additional 119 acres northeast of Milam and accommodate St.
Louis' daily glut of 3,000 tons of trash for the next 25 years.

But Andria and others say expanding the landfill is bad public policy
because it will reside in the middle of a floodplain adjacent to Horseshoe
Lake State Park. The dump's proximity to the mounds and the fact that
archaeologists unearthed ancient Indian remains in this place two years ago
are sore spots for environmental activists.

"I realize we need landfills," says Andria, "but they should be suitably
sited. I think there are many areas that are not adjacent to a state park
and next to the most culturally significant site in the state that's sacred
ground for Indians. And it certainly should not be in a floodplain, for
God's sake."

Despite Andria's efforts, Waste Management, which has operated Milam since
1984, has obtained nearly every permit necessary to begin construction.
Approval has already been granted by Madison County, the Illinois
Environmental Protection Agency and, as of last month, the Illinois
Pollution Control Board. The project currently faces what is essentially
its final hurdle: a federal study being prepared by the Army Corps of
Engineers. The study, due out in several months, will assess the new fill's
impact on the area's wetlands.

Lisa Disbrow, a spokeswoman for Waste Management, says she's confident the
company will pass muster. "We believe that we will be issued the permit,"
she says.

Prep work is now under way on the proposed site and construction will begin
immediately after the final go-ahead is granted.

Disbrow notes that Waste Management is taking steps to soften the blow to
the surrounding wetlands, including the installation of a high-tech lining
that will prevent pollutants from seeping into the ground. Asked why the
company chose a location fraught with controversy, Disbrow says, "With the
infrastructure we have at current facility, it makes more sense to expand
our current operations than to move and look for a different location."

Keith McMullen, a biologist at the Corps of Engineers, says his agency's
standards, as mandated by the Clean Water Act, are stringent. For the past
two years, the Corps has teamed up with the Environmental Protection
Agency, the Department of Fish and Wildlife and more than 100 other
agencies to determine what affect the dump will have on the surrounding
environment.

"You name it, we're involved with it," McMullen says. "Archaeological,
floodplain, aesthetics — the whole thing. You can't just put a checkmark
next to the box. You have to get the facts and get them documented."

McMullen says that his office has been swamped with thousands of comments
from the public opposing the dump. "It's just one of those things. Anytime
there's something that people don't want, they'll look for stuff to get the
public's eye, to get the public thinking there's something major-league
wrong," he says. "But they don't have facts. It's based on emotion. It's
'Not in my back yard.'"

Nothing has generated as much controversy as the December 2005 discovery of
an ancient Native American skull and pottery shards on farmland just beyond
the northern border of the proposed expansion. Given the location's
proximity to the Cahokia Mounds (the pair are separated by about two
miles), the find was a startling revelation. The mounds are the remnants of
what is believed to be the oldest Native American settlement in North
America. They are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, alongside global
landmarks such as the pyramids of Egypt and the Great Wall of China.
Because many of the mounds were used as tombs, some fear the skull found
near the landfill is part of a larger burial site.

Archaeologists from the Kansas City-based consulting firm Burns & McDonnell
were hired by Waste Management to comb the area of the proposed expansion
for evidence of any other remains. They ultimately concluded that the skull
was an isolated find. The Illinois Historic Preservation Agency (IHPA), the
state-run organization responsible for managing such discoveries, agreed.

"We spent over 2,000 man-hours going over this property," Disbrow says. "We
were very careful to check for remains. There's no evidence to suggest that
there's anything else there."

That's little comfort to Ruben Aguirre, a member of the Tongva tribe who
works with local tribes to protect Native-American heritage sites. "It's
our ancestors that are there," Aguirre says. "People look at it like maybe
we don't exist anymore. If you're not dressed in feathers and regalia, they
figure there's not native people left here."

John Kelly, an anthropology professor at Washington University, says he
reviewed reports on the skull prepared by Burns & McDonnell and was
disappointed by what he read. "It doesn't appear to be very well done,"
Kelly says. "They probably did what they were required to do by law, but
it's a question of going beyond the law and respecting the wishes of the
tribes. Even if it's just an isolated find like a human skull, from [the
Native American] perspective, regardless whether it is part of a person or
a whole person, it's still important."

Dawn Cobb, a skeletal remains coordinator for the IHPA who worked on the
Milam remains, says there's nothing her agency can do. "What they're doing
isn't anything illegal or immoral. They're doing business and they're
working within the law."

McMullen agrees that the archaeological findings aren't enough to hold up
the project. "We don't want to ignore it. We want tribes to be aware that
because of the religious or ceremonial value we want to be sensitive," he
says. "But there's not proof that [the skull] wasn't drug in by a coyote or
by floodwaters. There's lot of digging or research needed to prove or
disprove any theory."

Contact the author keegan.hamilton@...