Move comes as Fort Coulonge becomes 10th municipality to oppose EFW

by Charles Dickson

Litchfield

May 6, 2024

Litchfield municipal council gave unanimous support at its meeting on Monday evening for a resolution to bring the incinerator project to a halt this month.

The resolution calls for a motion to be tabled at next week’s meeting of MRC Pontiac mayors that would immediately end all activity by the warden and MRC staff on the Energy-from-Waste (EFW) project.

It also stipulates that the proposed motion prohibit any further expenditure of money from any source on any aspect of the EFW project, including studies and communication, and that the project be abandoned immediately.

The move follows last week’s news of the unanimous decision by the council of Fort Coulonge to withdraw its earlier support for the incinerator project, making it the 10th of Pontiac’s 18 municipalities that have formally registered their opposition.

At the MRC’s EFW presentation in Campbell’s Bay in April, Warden Jane Toller was asked what point would need to be reached to abandon the project. She replied “It would be when 10 mayors decide they don’t want to study this any further.”

“But we also are not planning to have a vote for a while, so there’s nothing to vote on,” she added.