Old Town residents are asking for new terms to a 21-year-old agreement between the city and the Juniper Ridge Landfill.
The Juniper Ridge Landfill has operated in Old Town since 1996, but a proposed expansion and an ongoing lawsuit over its environmental impact have opened new negotiations between the host communities and landfill. Negotiations between Casella Waste Systems, the company that operates the landfill, and the state and Old Town are ongoing.
Maine began operating the landfill, which was originally built in 1996 to handle waste from the Old Town paper plant, in 2004. A host community agreement with Old Town was agreed to on Dec. 8, 2005. That agreement is still in effect.
The current agreement sends millions in payments to Old Town for housing the facility, but proponents of a new contract say it doesn’t allow the city to use legal action to defend itself and is missing a key provision: a closure date.
John Dieffenbacher-Krall, an Old Town resident and environmental activist, has been one of the citizens speaking at council meetings urging the city to enter a new agreement that would better protect residents from potential environmental harm and create a closure date for the facility.
“This is sacrilege. This is an environmental abomination,” Dieffenbacher-Krall said.
The longstanding agreement is not equal to the “disproportionate burden” on Old Town, Alton and Penobscot Nation caused by having the landfill in their communities, he said. Provisions in the contract allow for suspension of payments if the city were to appeal any judgment or order related to the landfill or expansion, and if a city action, including enacted laws, were to limit the landfill’s operation.
The contract states that the clauses aren’t meant to “preclude the city from exercising statutory authority,” but Dieffenbacher-Krall and City Councilor Charlene Virgilio say it could restrict the community’s ability to protect itself from environmental concerns.
For the city, which is attempting to build business and lower taxes after ND Paper closed in 2023, losing funding for any period of time could limit operations, Virgilio said.
“I mean, we’re really between a rock and a hard place,” she said.
Old Town received more than $2.5 million from the agreement in 2025.
Negotiations between the parties are ongoing, but a recent change in how water runoff from the landfill will be treated 20 miles from the facility and the ongoing lawsuit have made the conversations more complicated because not every detail is known, City Manager Bill Mayo said.
The city hopes the issues have been “worked through the systems” by the next meeting “because without having answers on those matters, we are negotiating without all the information and it will continue to hamper negotiations,” Mayo said.
Casella will “continue to have productive conversations” with the city and are “committed to reaching an agreement that works well for the community and reflects our long-standing relationship,” Jeff Weld, a spokesperson for the company, said.
The next meeting of the city’s negotiation team, Casella and the state is scheduled for Dec. 22.
Virgilio and Dieffenbacher-Krall said they will both be closely following the lawsuit and listening to what ideas gubernatorial candidates Hannah Pingree, Rick Bennett and Bobby Charles have for the future of trash disposal in Maine.
No matter the outcome of the election or lawsuit, Virgilio said the city should be prepared to sign a contract that helps residents.
“I really think we have to decide what path we want to follow,” Virgilio said. “Do we work to stop the expansion, or if that expansion is a foregone conclusion, how then do we get the best agreement to support Old Town’s impact?”