Instead, the 224-acre operation near McConnellsburg is on hold, after neighboring residents and environmental activists concerned it would harm local water quality won a rare legal victory blocking it.
The dispute may be about to resume, as a representative of Country View Family Farms, the parent company for the swine operation, said it planned to reapply in June to the Department of Environmental Protection for approval of its stormwater management plan for the site.
“I’ve lived here for more than 30 years,” neighbor Marjorie Hudson said.
“My family is from here.
I don’t think this is the right thing in the right place.” From the time the companies proposed the hog farm in 2014, neighbors and environmental groups have voiced water pollution concerns to local and state officials.
The DEP accepted the application, even though shale soils vary widely and the ones proposed hadn’t been tested.
Opponents appealed to the Environmental Hearing Board, which reviews cases concerning state-issued permits.
It is like testing a bridge after it is mostly built…We are trying to imagine why the Department would not insist on appropriate pre- development testing to verify that a proposed infiltration system will work.” Further, Labuskes added, a DEP engineer testified that CFC Fulton’s infiltration methods were unorthodox, used in only three cases out of the 190 permits he had reviewed.
The law, he added, required the DEP to consider the overall environmental impact of the project, instead of the piecemeal, permit-by-permit approach that CFC favored, which Labuskes compared to “a blind man feeling the trunk of an elephant who thinks he has found a snake.” Bill Fink, environmental specialist for Country View Family Farms and CFC, said he was “very surprised” that the judge ruled against his company and the DEP.
They live nearby in Crystal Springs and are concerned about the hog farm.