Neighboring business dumping sewage waste and burning trash next to our land

[ErynSMA]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York

Hello all,

A few days ago I went to my mom's house and there was smoke EVERYWHERE. It smelled like someone was burning chemicals in a bonfire. I called the police in case it was something serious, but never heard anything on it. It happened again last night so I didn't even bother to call, figuring the other neighbors were just burning treated wood.

Today I went to a neighboring farm business (sells apples, etc) and took a hayride back to the petting zoo with my sisters and nephew. We paid admission to get in for this stuff. When my sisters and I decided to cut back a different way through their property, since there is a trail going from our house to the barn. I'd never personally used the trail before. When we were on the trail, we walked past a large, smoldering pile on their property filled with the remnants of a lot of burned garbage- numerous half-melted cider jugs, paper cups, papers and even a metal shopping cart.

So, my sister and went back onto my mom's property just over the line and sat and talked about what we should do. As this conversation was going on, they hauled back a port-a-potty that sits on the property by the petting farm and proceeded to discharge the waste into a stream that runs adjacent to both of my mom's and this businesses property.

We have well water, and a vegetable garden, and I am VERY concerned about:

1) the quality of air due to the burning of garbage
2) the residue left in the ground and on our gardens from this burning
3) the quality of the stream since they're dumping raw sewage into it
4) the quality of my mother's well water.

My sister wants to speak to the business owner, but is this even appropriate at this point? And what do I do? Call the police next time these people burn trash? Notify the building inspector? My mother thinks it's not a big deal, but a 3 year old lives here, and I'm extremely worried about the potentially damaging consequences of this behavior, especially on the family and my nephew.

As always, thanks for any help.

[alligatorob]

Try calling your regional NY Dept of Environmental Conservation offfice ([url=http://www.dec.ny.gov/about/558.html]DEC Regional Office Directory - NYS Dept. of Environmental Conservation[/url]). They should be able to help you understand what is legal and what is not and you can report a violation to them. Discharging a portapotty into a stream is most like illegal, of course you would have to prove they did it, but I don't know about the rest.