An aerial view of the American Iron and Metal recycling facility in Saint John, N.B. (Photo: Imagery ©2018 Google, Map data ©2018 Google)
The City of Saint John is voicing its concern regarding the American Iron and Metal scrap recycling plant and its upcoming permit renewal.
It will be sending a letter to Environment Minister Jeff Carr, the city outlines its concerns with the company’s ability to comply with their Provincial operating licence, which is up for renewal in June.
Their concerns also include a range of public safety and environmental issues, and the impact the facility has on the surrounding community.
This comes after a series of explosions at the plant late last year.
The city is floating the option that AIM’s operations be moved from it’s current home in the West Side to an industrial park.
Mayor Don Darling says he just wants to find balance.
“This is not an anti-industry message, this is about balance, and in a lot of cases actually all we’re asking for is for the approval to operate that’s been in place for many years to actually just be met,” he said during council Tuesday night.
Area Councillor Donna Reardon agrees. She says she’s been getting complaints about the shredding facility since she took office 7 years ago.
“Industry is good for community, because it does bring jobs, but it needs to bring value to your community, and when you have an industry that sucks the life right out of your community, it’s not good. It doesn’t matter how many jobs it brings,” she said during council.
Reardon compares the recent explosions at AIM to a headache, or pain in the body.
“If you have pain going on you can mask it with Tylenol, but there’s something going on that needs to be fixed, and those explosions are an indicator that there’s something wrong that needs to be fixed over there,” she said.
If operations do not move, the city is asking for strict controls and mitigation policies to protect West End residents.
The letter also asks for a risk assessment to be conducted, as well as a community impact assessment, two things that were not done.
Kevin Clifford with Saint John Fire and EMO says they were not consulted. Instead, they were provided with a copy of assessments done, but it did not do a risk assessment, so it did not provide an impact assessment on the community.
While the city did participate in an initial technical review and environmental planning process when the plant was first built in, and did relay concerns on locations and community impacts, they did not take a formal position on the project because of limited jurisdiction.
The port property is owned by the federal government and the province is responsible for issuing operating permits.
Darling hopes the letter captures their message loud and clear.
“There’s been an awful lot of work done on this and I think this letter finds a nice balance. I think it’s firm enough, and I think it’s direct enough to say ‘you should not grant a new approval until we have these pieces in place,'” he said.
