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Controversial Casmalia Toxic Dump Gets More Time to Clean Up Leaking Ponds

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Times Staff Writer

Operators of the Casmalia hazardous waste dump Friday were granted exemptions to the state’s tough toxic waste cleanup law, giving them more time to clean up leaking hazardous waste chemical ponds.

Detailed plans for cleaning the ponds are still to be worked out, but the action Friday by a state water control board clears the way for building five new, doubled-lined containment ponds that will replace the existing 58 reservoirs at the controversial Santa Barbara County site.

The effect of the action by the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board gives Casmalia Resources Co. up to five years to clean up 120 million gallons of toxic liquids on the site. Without the exemption, approved on a 4-2 vote, the state Toxic Pits Cleanup Act would have required the closing and cleanup of the ponds by June 31.

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The action was strongly opposed by Santa Barbara County health officials, environmentalists and Casmalia residents who want the toxic dump shut down entirely. The 252-acre hazardous waste disposal site is located 1 1/2 miles from the town of Casmalia, near Vandenberg Air Force Base.

‘Quick Solutions’

“The ponds are needed . . . they are critical to continued safe operation . . . even if the site is closed,” William Leonard, executive officer of the regional water board, said in an interview. “The public is looking for quick solutions, but there are no quick solutions to these things.”

Some of the 58 ponds on the site have been leaking and hazardous chemicals have been found directly beneath the dump, but it is unknown whether a toxic plume has moved beyond the landfill and invaded drinking water aquifers.

State regulators in 1985 banned new shipments of liquid wastes to the dump. The Casmalia dump is only one of two Southern California facilities that continue to accept hazardous solid waste, up to 85 truckloads a day.

The new ponds are needed to handle liquid waste already on the site and to contain millions of gallons of rainwater that is contaminated as it runs off the dump site into nearby Casmalia Creek.

“If we don’t get the exemptions . . . we’ll have to let the rainwater run over the (existing) dams,” Casmalia Resources President Ken Hunter Jr. said in an interview before the board’s action. “When it rains an inch, we get 5 million gallons, and we have to do something with it. . . . We propose to treat it and discharge it into (Casmalia) creek,” he said.

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Under state law, toxic ponds within half a mile of underground drinkable water supplies must be closed by June 31, Leonard said. But, he said, the act provides exemptions “if the ponds are not an extreme hazard or if the liquid is not migrating and if the ponds meet new (safety) standards.”

He said the new ponds would not pose a hazard.

Opponents strongly disagreed with the board’s action. They pointed out that recent state studies revealed that high concentrations of toxic chemicals like carbon tetrachloride, methylene chloride and the industrial solvent TCE (tetrachloroethylene) have been found under existing containment ponds. They are afraid that these hazardous wastes will migrate into nearby water tables.

Water Table

Leonard acknowledged that tests have shown that dozens of hazardous chemicals have leaked from the ponds into the underground water table beneath the dump. He said there is “no solid evidence” that the contaminated waters have moved off the facility.

“The Health Department and the Board of Supervisors are concerned about these exemptions,” said Dr. Sara Miller, a Santa Barbara County Health Department representative.

She said that until the state board has adequate data to determine the levels of ground water contamination under the site, “no exemption should be made.”

Also opposing the exemption was Kenneth McCalip, principal of the two-room Casmalia Elementary School, which twice has been shut down because of toxic fumes from the dump site. In an interview, he called Friday’s vote “a green light” for Casmalia Resources’ plan to modernize the dump operations, adding, “They should first have to clean up the site . . . then talk modernization after the cleanup.”

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Several times during the hearing, Leonard and board members tried to explain to opponents that the exemption vote had nothing to do with the larger argument over whether the Casmalia dump will remain open.

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