The Service 3R Valorisation sorting center, located in Montreal East, is overflowing. However, despite numerous notices of non-compliance and large sums due to the Canadian and Quebec tax authorities, the company recently benefited from a reprieve from the Ministry of the Environment, noted The duty. The site manager, who signed this agreement with Quebec, had trouble with the law.
The 3R Valorisation site, which covers around 10,000 square meters, is awash in construction residues. During our visit, the heaps reached nine meters in places, a height well above the limit of five meters allowed in the certificate of authorization issued by the Ministry of the Environment.
The mountains of tailings are such that a “crossed-off sidewalk” poster and orange cones have been installed, as a safety measure, along the low wall surrounding the site. The infrastructures used to sort residual materials, partly buried, are currently inaccessible. However, this does not prevent trucks from transporting other residues there.
Violations and fines
Since 2013, 3R Valorisation has been in the sights of the Ministry of the Environment. Six inspections revealed breaches of Québec environmental standards: height of piles and storage areas not respected, debris falling on neighboring properties, leachate flowing from the site during snowmelt and failure to keep a register of materials entering and leaving the site.
“The operator refused to allow the inspector to consult the registers of inputs and outputs of the sorting center”, specifies in an order the Ministry of the Environment, following an inspection carried out in 2017.
Over the past 10 years, the department issued five notices of non-compliance and imposed three fines, to date unpaid, totaling $17,500.
Despite this delinquent behavior, the Ministry of the Environment recently reduced the company’s obligations. Under a conciliation agreement concluded last October, Quebec allows 3R Valorisation to form, until next April, heaps nine meters high. He gives him until April 2024 to meet the criteria of his certificate of authorization, which authorizes heaps of five meters.
Why such a reprieve? The ministry indicates that this agreement was concluded after 3R Valorisation challenged the government’s decisions. The Minister of the Environment, Benoit Charette, “is following the situation closely,” says his press secretary, Mélina Jalbert. “If the measures are not respected, the minister is determined to take the necessary remedies,” she said.
3R Valorisation is experiencing major financial problems. In this context, will the company be able to meet its new obligations with regard to the Ministry of the Environment by spring 2024? “In theory, yes”, answers the lawyer of 3R Valorisation, Me Karl-Emmanuel Harrison. Since 2022, 3R Valorisation has had new outlets for disposing of fine fractions, according to the lawyer, who specifies that the company is currently waiting for a sieve to ensure the sorting of these materials. “The sorting table has been faulty since the summer; it is not currently accessible”, which would explain why “receptions are reduced to a minimum”.
Me Harrison adds that “the commitments are clear”. “There is an 18-month deadline to resolve the two problems: the pile height problem and [une réduction] of the stack of fine fractions. » Fine fractions are materials such as wood, glass, gypsum or asphalt shingles.
For the director of the Quebec Common Front for Ecological Waste Management, Karel Ménard, the reprieve offered by the Ministry of the Environment, “it’s almost a complicity” given the environmental history of the company: “You , try not to pay a fine to the ministry. I’m pretty sure you’re going to have a clog from Denver in the next year. Why are they giving such deadlines? Honestly, I have no idea, but to me, that’s unacceptable. »
Trouble with the law
The president of 3R Valorisation, Simon Bergeron, on sick leave since the summer, refused our interview request.
During our visit to the sorting center, two men in a truck blocked the road to the vehicle of the To have to on the public road. When questioned about 3R Valorisation’s environmental shortcomings, the driver sent the log to 3R Valorisation’s lawyer, Mr.e Harrison: “You should talk to him before you write anything, [parce qu’il] going to be big, big changes. »
The man met in Montreal East turns out to be Jean-François Boisvert. Director of sorting center operations, Mr. Boisvert currently holds the reins of the company. It was he who, as the legally authorized representative of 3R Valorisation, signed the conciliation agreement with the Ministry of the Environment.
Jean-François Boisvert has had many run-ins with the law. He pleaded guilty to extortion in 2009. Two years later, the office of his company, Remblais JFA, was raided as part of the second phase of Project Vice, a major investigation carried out by Revenu Québec and the Sûreté du Québec (SQ). The move targeted companies that allegedly benefited from “a convenience billing network” in the construction and transportation sectors, according to court documents. In 2017, the company, which is no longer in operation, pleaded guilty to a reduced charge for failing to comply with the Excise Tax Act. Charges targeting Mr. Boisvert personally were dropped a year later.
In 2015, the decontamination company Gestion OFA Environnement, of which Jean-François Boisvert was director of operations, found itself in the spotlight. It is then the subject of an investigation by the SQ and the Ministry of the Environment for having illegally dumped contaminated soil. As part of this investigation, dubbed Naphtalène, the authorities conducted searches “aimed in particular at alleged offenses of possession of property obtained by crime, production and use of forgery, fraud, mischief and laundering of proceeds of crime and participation in the activities of a criminal organization”.
The investigation aborted in 2018 for “insufficient evidence [pouvant] establish the guilt of the suspects”, according to the Director of Criminal and Penal Prosecutions. Gestion OFA Environnement is now suing the Government of Quebec as well as an investigator from the Ministry of the Environment and investigators from the SQ. She is claiming $4.25 million for damage to her reputation and in punitive damages, among other things. “The searches were not based on reasonable grounds; [elles] led to the closure of the company,” says Mr.e Harrison, also a lawyer for Gestion OFA Environnement. In its request, the company also accuses the SQ of having leaked information in the media, which would have harmed its image. Jean-François Boisvert declined to comment on these files.
In 2020, the Ministry of the Environment this time took an interest in 3R Valorisation. In an application for an injunction filed with the Superior Court, he indicates that a spinning operation revealed that residual materials from the Montreal East sorting center were illegally dumped on a site in Saint-Gabriel-de- Brandon, in Lanaudière, what was reported The Press at the time. “This site had to meet conditions to receive materials and did not meet them. From the moment the ministry provided us with documents, [3R Valorisation] has stopped sending material there, ”says Me Harrison.
3R Valorisation is today at a crossroads. It does not intend to continue its activities in its current form. Me Karl-Emmanuel Harrison confirms that 3R Valorisation has taken steps to sell its assets. “Offers have been made by some people to acquire the land,” he says.
Regardless of the scenarios considered, the site will be cleaned up, he assures. “Either there is a sale of the land and the buyer cleans up. Either the company cleans and sells, or [3R Valorisation] cleans up and continues its activities. » Is bankruptcy planned? “This is not the scenario envisaged. »