Talking trash: CLF launches the zero waste project to tackle Massachusetts's trash problem.

• Jurisdiction: United States
• Date: 22 March 2017

On a Monday night in February, more than 100 people crowded into the Sturbridge, Massachusetts, town hall for an emergency meeting of the town's Board of Health. Nineteen wells in the Sturbridge neighborhood closest to the massive Southbridge Landfill had just tested high for lead--a dangerous neurotoxin proven to do irreversible harm to young children. Recent tests had also revealed a possible carcinogen, 1,4 Dioxane, in six wells in the same testing area.

The residents in the town hall that night were tired, frustrated, and angry. This wasn't the first time that wells near the landfill had tested positive for contamination; more than 15 dangerous toxins were found in home wells in nearby Charlton in 2015. Like their Charlton neighbors, these Sturbridge residents would now be forced to use bottled water for drinking, cooking, and brushing their teeth, while still having to bathe their children in the contaminated water.

Though the landfill's owner, Casella Waste, denied any links between its facility and the well contamination, residents knew of no other source of such industrial pollution near their homes. With Casella Waste now seeking approval from the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to dramatically expand the state's largest landfill for the second time in 10 years, residents were fed up. One by one, they stood up that night to demand of the DEP's Regional Director, "What is it going...