Santa Barbara County Orders Additional Monitoring of Casmalia Toxics Landfill

The Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors on Monday ordered the Casmalia Resources hazardous waste landfill near Santa Maria to install additional ground water and air quality monitoring equipment by July 20 or face a county lawsuit aimed at closing the dump.

The county took the action despite a finding last January by the state Department of Health Services that there were no legal grounds for closing the 250-acre dump because there was no evidence that it posed “an imminent and substantial endangerment to health and the environment.”

The state’s finding, which followed field studies and a long public hearing last June, outraged residents of nearby communities and led to Monday’s 4-0 vote by supervisors.

Officials said they hope that the added air and water quality monitoring will result in “real evidence” of toxic contamination that will force the state either to take action to eliminate the hazard or to close the facility. Present monitoring, they said, is not comprehensive enough.

Kenneth Hunter Jr., a major partner in Casmalia Resources, said Monday, however, that only the state has authority to issue such an order. He said Casmalia Resources will challenge the county’s authority to order monitoring.

Hunter said that the landfill has complied with state and federal monitoring requirements and that stepped-up ground water monitoring is planned.

‘We’ve Done Everything’

“We’ve done everything required of us and more, but it’s never quite enough, because really what they want to do is close you down,” Hunter said in a telephone interview.

Deputy County Counsel Jed Beebe said that whether the county has the authority to impose the requirement will turn on a court’s interpretation of state law as to what is “reasonable.” He said that the law prohibits a county from imposing “unreasonable regulations or prohibiting a hazardous waste disposal site.”

He said the ordinance provides for misdemeanor criminal penalties of a $1,000 fine and six months in jail and civil penalties of up to $25,000 for each day the facility is in violation.

Monday’s vote followed a demonstration outside the supervisors’ chambers in Santa Barbara by residents and Greenpeace activists, some of whom wore surgical masks.

During the hearing, Kathleen Barca of Los Alamos told supervisors that her teen-age son was hunting in nearby hills when he was overcome by toxic fumes.

“These are my children and I am their mother, and I have the right to defend them any way I see fit as their mother. And, by God, if you don’t do something, I will defend my children in any way I see fit. I will not stop. You will close that dump. Someone will close it or we will,” she said.