Blockade gone for good

Thursday, July 19, 2012

by SUSAN MANN

An injunction preventing the blockade of an industrial subdivision in Grey County’s Southgate Township is now permanent.

The decision from an Owen Sound court was handed down Thursday, one week after an agreement was reached to implement an interim injunction to dismantle the blockade by members of the Southgate Public Interest Research Group (SPIRG) and other protesters. The blockade was taken down last Thursday.

Last Thursday’s agreement, also reached in an Owen Sound courtroom, was between the SPIRG, Southgate Township and the two companies in the Eco Park who were barred from accessing their businesses since the blockade was erected April 4. They are Lystek Inc. and Orgapower Compost Corp., which makes municipal yard and leaf waste into compost, soil conditions and other byproducts of the composting process. The two companies and township sought the injunction to remove the blockade.

The group is concerned about Lystek’s plans to establish a facility in the Eco-Industrial Park located near the Village of Dundalk to process dewatered biosolids, septage and other liquids into a fertilizer product that can be spread on farmers’ fields.

Thursday’s decision says any and all attempts to block the entrance of the park are illegal, it says in a July 19 Southgate Township press release. The court also rejected a request to stop Lystek from constructing its facility in the Eco-Park.

Rick Mosher, Lystek president, says in the press release they are grateful for the permanence the decision brings. BF