The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

a CITT, 18 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Wednesday, October 10, 1990 Landowner sees no logic in this dump site by John B. McClelland Star Editor Standing on a high point of land less than a mile south of the "four corners" of Blackstock, This sign pretty well sums up how Jim Swain and his This site, south of Black- stock, bordered on the north by Concession 3, the south by the - Shirley Road and the east by oud g Road, is one of two Sites in Bes gous Ward 4 (Cart- wright) named as potential A - neighbours feel. Some 700 acres of prime farmland south of Blackstock have been selected as one of the potential sites for a Durham Reglon garbage dump. With Jim in photo are daughter Karen (right) and her friend Andrea Johns. That's "Rebel" in front, the family pet. (see story) the view is one of rural tranquil- ity. Gazing to the south and west on a warm, sunny early October afternoon, the colours are almost soothing to the eyes. The plowed fields are a rich, deep brown, the pastures a soft green. In the distance a field of corn stands waiting for harvest. ~The afternoon sun glints pale yellow with flashes of red and orange, from the trees in two stands of mature hard- woods. Here and there, graze. The panorama has a time- less quality to it, and well it should, for this land was cleared before the turn of the century, and successive genera- tions have worked and tilled it ever since. Jim Swain ponders the n pasture beneath his feet or a moment and agrees that "this really makes no sense at all. That's the scarey part of it, ess." He can't believe that the land on which he is standing, and all the land visible to the eye to the south, east arid west, could someday be covered in mi- lions of tonnes of garbage. "Could." That's the big word for people like Jim and his neighbours all around. They find it incredible that some of the finest, most fertile farm-land in the Township, gome 700 acres of it, has been selected as a potential site for a huge landfill. cattle sites for garbage. There are three other potential sites in Durham Region, designated by a firm of consulting engineers working for Durham Region. Jim Swain owns 50 acres of land smack dab in the middle of the potential site. If the engineering tests and _ all the environmental hearings and probing determine that this land is to be the site of the new dump, his land will go, so will the lovely, restored farm house where he lives with his wife Su- san and their two young chil- dren. So will the Malcolm farm to the south-east, the Don Swain farm due south, and the Werry farm just to the west, a farm that has been in the family four generations. In all, ten farms with 11 homes could disappear under tonnes of grabage that will be dumped there for 20 years. As we walk slowly across the pasture land, Jim points out the fence lines, water courses, the barns at his neighbours' farms, that hard-wood bush where they still tap for maple syrup each spring. And the conversation keeps coming back to the question, why. Why this particular chunk of rural Scugog Township. Jim says he's at a loss to explain it logically, except for the Fact the soil is clay-loam, apparently an important criteria in finding a dump site. veral times he says that surely in all of Durham Region, TUR a mame am OT there must be another site for a dump that would not eat up such prime farmland and total- -ly disrupt the lives of so many people. He notes that the land drains to the north, towards the hamlet of Blackstock were the homes are all on wells. Jim is not a full time farm- er. "The 50 acres wouldn't sup- portus," he says with a smile. He works at GM, his wife is .a medical lab technologist. He keeps about 40 head of beef cattle and plants and hay on some of the lan But this 50 acres, the weathered barn, and the two- storey brick farm-house are in his blood. . ~ Just to the west of Jim Swain's farm Is the Werry farm. It has been in the same family land had been designated as a potential dump site. Ironically, he had read the day before that two sites were pamed in Cartwright, but when two people arrived at his door with sheafs of paper in their hands, the news hit home like a bolt. The shock still hasn't worn off. Like all his neighbours, Jim is determined to fight this to the end. He won't sign the pa ing permission for test be : wy Wig do have to get a court order, I guess" (to get on his land) . He doesn't display any out- ward anger talking about this rgiv- oles to not much point to that. There's nothing to talk about." He remains ho 1 that in the long run some kind of logic will prevail, and this tract of land will not end up as a gar- bage dump. But even that has its own worries. If this site is ruled out, it will still be marked on some map as a "once potential site," and who's to say it will not be re- designated some time in the fu- ture. f If the un-thinkakble hap- pens and Jim is forced to leave the land and his home, he says for four generations, and Is in the middie of the site for the potential dump. In all, ten farms could disappear if the dump Is ever approved on this site. The property owners are gear- ing up for a fight. He was born on the farm, nt his childhood here, and is is where he wants his son and daughter to spend their childhood. His father Harold owned the farm, and before that his great uncle Albert Werry, who built the old house in 1899. Jim's not sure just who had this land before great uncle Al- bert. Heleft for a time, lived else- where, but returned in 1975, for what he thought would be for Jim and his wife complete- ly re-modelled the house, in- cluding the exterior brick-work. It was on Sept. 22, a Satur- day, that Jim first learned his If the dump Is ever approved on the sit farm would disappear. The brick house was family for three generations. issue, but he's bitter about the process, and why Cartwright was selected for two potential sites (the other is on Highway 7A, east of Nestleton) "Is it divide and conquer?" he wonders, an attempt to split the community, pit the people of one area against the other. And like his neighbours, he doesn't trust the process, doesn't trust the engineers and' doesn't trust the politicians who will make the eventual deci- gion, based on what the engi- neers say. , He doesn't think "kitchen table" meetings with the engi- neers will do any good. "There's " LETTERS TO THE EDITOR The Star encourages our readers to make use of the letters to the editor column to express their opinions and vie about any subject, as we feel a live better community newspaper. We Insist, however, that all letter writers sign their name. Sorry, no anonymous letters will be printed. ints on just letters column helps make a "- e south of Blackstock, the Swain home and built in 1899 and the farm has been in the he'll move "out of Durham Re- gion, that's for sure." But that won't happen without a fight. Citizens groups are being formed in Cartwright, public meetings are being called. And on the fence posts that. smrround the land, there are home-made signs ted stat- ing "farmland, not dumpland." Swain, Malcolm, Werry, Bradburn, Graham, Green, and the others are old family names in Cartwright, and the land has been passed from generation to generation. ' It's good land, fertile land and all they want is to see it stay that way. Please recycle this newspaper