This is the unedited bulk of a relatively long hearing on the application of Ridgefield's "Crown Carting" for the ability to establish a Waste Transfer Station in Ridgefield, NJ. ........The original application included "Type 10" waste which is the putrescible/stinky stuff (disposable diapers etc etc etc) we normal think of as household/hospital (yes the statute goes out of its way to include that category......talk about a massive petri dish!!!) garbage. ......... That application was totally withdrawn after local community activists turned on a few lights and the local Town Council and Mayor raised issues/objections.....but clearly the INTENT was there to simply slide this thing through the regulatory process in the dark....and if they could have gotten away with it that first proposal would have continued on its "merry" way.*******According to the local newspaper account there were about a hundred attendees......according to the observations of some of the people there, there were closer to two hundred. ...........In any case there were far more people than available seats and there were people standing all around the room and into the hallway entering the room and even standing outside into the foyer! As you can see and hear from the video....the presiding BCUA Commissioner was visibly surprised at the turnout......and keep in mind that this was scheduled right at 6:00 PM and on a hot summer day. The air conditioning didn't extend well into the hallway and some of the folks there couldn't all even hear what was going on. ******* As the hearing progressed there were a good number of people who had signed up to speak.......but weren't able to wait two hours and left early. ***********What you see here is raw footage of the hearing......... and kudos to all you policy wonks and very concerned residents who have the stamina/attention span to watch the whole thing! I suspect that many of the people who will be watching the whole thing will be people who will be being paid a GREAT DEAL OF MONEY to do so.....and that that category of individuals will likely be doing the bidding of the applicant, for whom this obviously represents a golden opportunity to make more money......and in all manner of potential scenarios! ***** Ideally, public policy decisions should be driven by what's objectively best for the people of the community as a whole.....and not what's best for the most wealthy, powerful, ambitious and ruthless minority. ******That's what democracy is all about; human rights, common human decency, fairness, justice, honesty and doing what's right because it's right.....not just doing what can make you more money at the expense of the potential health and well being of the broader community......democracy is also about the rights of the individual, and the applicant here deserves respect for asserting his own rights *within the framework of the law*. Let's face it, it's the job of a business to make money and the more money the better.....there are no limits, so long as folks stay within the law. *******The larger issue here is the extent to which the letter of the law is perverted by individuals who regulate and enforce the statutes in ways that violate the SPIRIT (if not the letter) of the law. ............Yes, recycling IS a good and necessary thing; but it's wrong to use recycling as a pretext to do something which will cause far far far greater harm to the community at large than the relatively minimal costs of having the marginal amount of recycling in question be done in another facility........I truly hope that I was 100% wrong in my closing remarks at this hearing wherein I stated that this would likely be a long and drawn out struggle....and that the governing bodies would only do the right thing if there was massive organized informed and focused public opposition........I want to be wrong! I would be elated to see the BCUA commissioners stand up and dismiss this flawed application at their earliest opportunity. This should NOT go to the next stage.....but if it does, it is clear on it's face that the ONLY way to stop it will be the application of sheer logic, facts, rationality, intelligence, common human decency/common sense AND a very healthy dose of community involvement/activism. Without that last ingredient our democracy is a hollow farce and we are left to live our our lives in a de facto plutocracy in which those with money to buy the laws and the lawmakers and the law enforcers "win". That's not a sustainable long term model for human existence. Less