judith enck president of beyond plastics and a former epa regional administrator said another concern associated with landfills can be the release of methane gas from rotting garbage and its contribution to climate change as long as seneca meadows is operational we will always be there for our neighborsfrom investing in new green technologies to supporting worthy charities and creating and retaining good paying jobs prior to her death annette lutz helped pass a local law that would make seneca meadows close in 2025 they are making the local environment more polluted than it should be just like abcs plastic bag tracker many items at seneca meadows come from places located a distance away according to filings posted by the new york state department of environmental conservation the landfills 2020 annual report shows that less than 1 of the waste that it received that year came from seneca county while 659 came from ulster county home to the kingston target weve done our part he said weve suspected that a lot of recyclables end up in the landfill and thats exactly the root of the problem that waste would likely be trucked to neighboring states with less stringent waste management regulations to facilities with inferior infrastructure and staff that havent been trained to our industry leading standards black added courtesy of mark pitifer half of the trackers last pinged from incinerators or landfills many of which are located in rural areas like seneca county its the not knowing that makes you lose sleep at night a plastic bag tracker dropped off by abc news in ulster county new york later pinged more than 200 miles away at this landfill in seneca county many were trashed more we take seriously the role we play in reducing waste and were committed to looking at our processes to improve our recycling efforts the statement said in part in a statement to abc news target said that last year the company recycled nearly 24 million pounds worth of plastic bags and plastic film materials it was just one of 46 trackers dropped off by abc news and collaborating abc stations at retail stores nationwide as part of an investigation called trashed the secret life of plastic recycling weve suspected for quite a while that our recycling programs dont work as theyre supposed to said rich swinehart ceo of waterloo container a business near seneca meadows to bill lutz the last thing that his community needs is more garbage i understand the position that the world needs a place to dispose of their waste said resident bill lutz we dont know whats in the water more video trashed the secret life of plastic recycling lutzs wife annette who was a member of the seneca falls town board died in 2019 more than 200 miles away from the kingston new york target stores plastic bag recycling bin lies seneca meadows a landfill that does not recycle plastic bags abc news however landfill owner