Town Alters Lawsuit Settlement with Sanitation Company

A lawsuit settlement between the Town of Riverhead and a sanitation company was amended at the Town Board's meeting on Tuesday evening after the sanitation company backed out of the original agreement.

The new agreement states that Crown Sanitation will clean up gathered wood waste at town facilities free, saving the town roughly $30,000, Town Supervisor Sean Walter said.

The original agreement, which was approved by the Town Board on Aug. 25, didn't indemnify the town, so the agreement had to be changed, Walter said. At the time, town officials hoped to use the settlement to clean up the aftermath of Hurricane Irene, but instead FEMA helped assist the town.

The lawsuit, filed in 2009 by the Town of Riverhead against the Youngs Avenue recycling company, claimed the company had illegally cleared a 14-acre site adjacent to its recycling facility for illegal sand mining.

Crown Sanitation had received a permit from the town's building department for "agricultural use," and said their clearing was justified because they were using the land for a tree farm. Since the activity was agricultural, the company said they were exempt from needing an excavation permit for the land.

The Town Board disagreed and issued a stop-work order. Crown, which had already begun excavations, refused, which led to the lawsuit from the town. 

Walter said on Tuesday that the case was not handled properly by the town and it was time to put the litigation behind them.

"It's one of those cases, shame on the town," Walter said.