County Surveys Sites for Toxic Waste Dump Despite Opposition

County geologists are surveying two privately owned sites in northern Los Angeles County this week to determine their suitability for use as hazardous waste dumps.

Superior Court Judge Robert H. O’Brien ordered the Newhall Land and Farming Co. on Feb. 20 to allow county workers onto its Portrero Canyon Ranch in the Santa Clarita Valley to study the terrain. The judge gave geologists 14 working days--until March 18--to prepare a map of the location and select spots for borings in the land.

O’Brien also ordered the Tejon Ranch Co. to give county geologists access to land it owns in Oso Canyon near Gorman. The county was also limited to 14 working days on that site and geologists are scheduled to complete their investigation there today.

About 100 acres are being studied at each site, said Kieran Bergin, a county sanitation district engineer who is heading the search for a dump location.

Two of Four Possible Sites

Oso and Portrero canyons are two of four sites in the sparsely populated northern rim of the county that are being considered for the waste facility. The others are on a county-owned wildflower sanctuary in the Mojave Desert and at the south rim of Rosamond Dry Lake on Edwards Air Force Base.

The dump would handle hazardous wastes from businesses throughout Los Angeles County after the material has been processed into dry residue at a series of treatment plants, which are still in the planning stages, county officials said. The hazardous waste, usually cleaning solvents or other chemicals, is now trucked about 150 miles north of Los Angeles to dumps near Bakersfield and Santa Barbara.

Despite the favorable court rulings, the search has been difficult for the county. So far it has met opposition to every site it has proposed.

Until the court rulings, county geologists had gained access to test only one of the four proposed sites--the county’s Butte Valley Wildflower Sanctuary in the desert community of Hi Vista. Soil tests there drew protests from residents and a reported promise from Supervisor Mike Antonovich--although his office would not confirm it last week--that the sanctuary will not become a burial ground for toxic wastes.

Appeal Made to Weinberger

Bergin said Edwards Air Force Base officials have refused to allow county geologists to survey their area, so the county last month appealed to Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger for permission to drill on the base.

Calvin O. Walters Jr., president of Tejon Ranch, asked in January that Oso Canyon be dropped from the list of possible dump sites.

In a letter to the Board of Supervisors, Walters said the Oso Canyon site is upstream of the California Aqueduct and Quail Lake, both parts of the State Water Project, which supplies about a third of the Santa Clarita Valley’s water. It also is near two earthquake faults, he said.

“Spending substantial and scarce public funds investigating a site which is clearly unsuitable makes no sense,” he said.

Newhall Land and Farming is solidly aligned with local residents against construction of a hazardous waste facility at the Portrero Canyon site, now used as a cattle ranch and for oil drilling, south of state Highway 126 and west of Interstate 5.

Plans for Development Cited

“We’ve always had intentions of developing that area into a planned community,” said Gloria Casvin, a vice president of Newhall Land and Farming. “Those plans haven’t changed.”

However, Santa Clarita Valley community leaders appear to be resigned to the idea that a toxic waste dump will be situated somewhere in northern Los Angeles County.

“It’s the only place available,” said JoAnne Darcy, an aide to Antonovich, who represents the area. But people do not want the facility in their backyard, she said.

“I’m so tired of fighting the battle every time they want to dump something out here,” said Robin Geissler, who initiated a group to oppose locating a state prison in Saugus.

Geissler said she is concentrating her efforts on the drive to establish a new city in the Santa Clarita Valley. “If we were a city, we’d have more clout to fight these things,” she said.

Community activist Jim Scott said the county should find a more remote place to bury its waste. He said many people will welcome drilling at the Portrero Canyon site because they believe that it will prove the location to be geologically unsuitable for such a dump.

‘Killer Highway’ a Factor

Connie Worden, a Santa Clarita Valley resident who serves on the county’s Solid Waste Management Advisory Board, complained that the only access to the Portrero Canyon location is over Highway 126, which she termed a “killer highway” because of a large number of fatal accidents on the road.

Having 40 to 50 large trucks making round trips to the dump daily, the number estimated by county officials, would increase the traffic hazards on the highway, Worden said.

In addition, Worden said, the area provides part of the natural ground water supply for Ventura County.

But Bergin said the county’s method of handling the toxic waste would all but eliminate the risk of ground water contamination. The waste would be chemically treated at one of six regional waste treatment plants in industrial sectors and turned into less hazardous dry cakes and rock-like materials, he said. These dry residues would be buried in clay-lined repositories that would not leak into the soil or ground water, he said.

“They’re not liquid,” Bergin said. “They won’t produce fumes. In the event of a spill, they can be cleaned up with a broom.”

Says County Has Need

Bergin said the county must develop its own facility so that control of hazardous wastes is not left to private landfill owners. He said the private facilities are not as safe as the one that the county has proposed.

Until November, 1984, the county disposed of its hazardous waste in the privately owned BKK landfill in West Covina. But that facility was closed after explosive levels of methane were discovered in the air at 19 homes near the site. Ground water contamination also was found under BKK.

Since then, firms producing hazardous wastes have had to hire trucking companies to haul the material to the dumps near Bakersfield and Santa Barbara.

“If we don’t manage our hazardous wastes, they are going to find their way into our ground water,” Bergin said.

Despite officials’ reassurances, Worden predicted that Ventura County residents will join the protest of the Portrero Canyon location because of fears the water supply might be contaminated.

Santa Clarita Valley residents also fear ground water contamination, and have long opposed having a toxic waste dump anywhere in the fast-growing area, Worden said.

The Portrero Canyon site is just outside the boundaries of the proposed new city of Santa Clarita, which would include the communities of Canyon County, Castaic, Newhall, Valencia and Saugus, Worden said.

The two sides use different words to describe the planned facility. To county officials, it’s a “repository.” But to Worden, “it’s still a dump.”