Juniper Ridge Landfill

The Senate unanimously approved the proposal late last week. The House of Representatives approved the bill in a 102-25 vote on Monday, and a spokesperson for Gov. Janet Mills said on Tuesday that she'll sign it.

The bill, approved by a 32-0 vote on Wednesday, aims to close a loophole that allowed out-of-state trash to be processed and reclassified in Maine, and then dumped in Maine’s only publicly owned landfill, Juniper Ridge, near Old Town.

Here’s a look at how out-of-state waste is getting to Maine, and what state officials are trying to do about it.

Environmental activists, neighbors of the landfill including the Penobscot Nation and a growing group of lawmakers have decried the unique set of circumstances that allow private companies to dump so much material from Massachusetts into the state facility, despite laws that were once meant to prevent that.

The bill's sponsor, Democratic Sen. Anne Carney of Cape Elizabeth, told fellow lawmakers Monday that the loophole results in thousands of tons of trash ending up at the Juniper Ridge landfill norther of Old Town each year, putting nearby communities such the Penobscot Nation at risk of pollution.

Activists and neighbors of the state-owned Juniper Ridge Landfill in Old Town, Maine are calling for an end to the dumping of out-of-state waste there.…

The process has been going on for more than four years, but Casella Waste Systems and the state moved closer today to getting a decision on their planned…