Court Flares Trash Plant Debate Again

Opponents of a controversial trash-to-energy plant were claiming victory Friday after an appellate court ruling, but promoters of the project maintained that the decision does little to block their plans.

“To us the court’s decison states quite clearly that the project does not stand,” said Jonathan Wiltshire, president of Citizens for Healthy Air in San Marcos, a group opposed to the plant.

But leaders of North County Resource Recovery Associates, proponents of the $220-million plant, countered that the decision would not stand in the way of the project.

“It really doesn’t do anything,” said Richard Chase, managing director of the firm.

In April, the 4th District Court of Appeal ruled that the City Council should have ordered an environmental impact report before amending the city’s general plan, which paved the way for the trash-to-energy plant to be built at the county landfill on Questhaven Road.

Chase and other backers of the plant accepted that verdict, and the city has begun preparing the review of its amended general plan.

Nonetheless, the plant’s proponents were troubled by language in the April appellate court ruling, which they felt had “cast doubt on the validity” of the special-use permit issued by the City Council for the project.

That language, they said, could be used by opponents, who have filed another lawsuit challenging the permit. Eager for the appeal court to delete the troublesome language from the legal brief issued in the April decision, the trash plant firm asked that the three-judge court rehear the matter.

In a 25-page legal brief issued late Friday, the court used most of the wording of the prior legal brief. But Chase and other plant supporters say enough of the original decision was changed to keep the trash-to-energy project on track.

“It’s neither a win nor a loss,” Chase said. “The net result of it is the validity of the permits is going to be left to be litigated another day.”

Wes Peltzer, general counsel for NCRRA, agreed.

“Every indication we have is that the plan is to proceed as quickly as we can, barring the court telling us our special-use permit is not valid,” Peltzer said.

Wiltshire, however, argued that the appeal court brief issued Friday had done just that.

Although some of the language critical of the plant’s special-use permit was removed in the new legal ruling, the key points were not, he said.

The justices ruled that “to allow the (trash-to-energy plant) approval to stand would be to sanction piecemeal environmental review, allowing one aspect of a project to be approved before the environmental consequences of the larger project are reviewed.”

In addition, they questioned whether the state Legislature had “intended local governments to site such facilities as the trash-to-energy project contemplated here through zoning for ‘garbage dumps’ and ‘public utilities.’ ” The original environmental review for the site only addressed having a landfill and did not consider the trash-burning plant.

Opponents of the project hope the decision means that plant backers must again go through the process of seeking a special-use permit to operate in San Marcos, something that could tie the proposal in red tape for months or even years.

The legal challenge against the plant was mounted by Christward Ministry, a 640-acre religious retreat 1 1/2 miles from the plant site. Neither the Rev. Stephen Isaac, president of Christward Ministry, nor the group’s attorney could be reached for comment.

The plant is designed to burn most of North County’s garbage to reduce the dependence on landfills, and to generate electricity for 40,000 households.