County : Development Plan Opposed

The County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to strongly oppose a pending Los Angeles development plan that would block the use of three Westside canyons as a regional landfill.

The board, on a 3-1 vote, directed its staff to argue at City Council hearings against a provision in the proposed Mulholland Scenic Parkway Specific Plan that prohibits development of Mission, Rustic and Sullivan canyons for garbage disposal.

The directive appears contrary to positions taken last May by three of the five supervisors--Deane Dana, Mike Antonovich and Ed Edelman. They either opposed a landfill in the canyons or said they would consider it only as a last resort to solve long-range garbage disposal problems.

On Tuesday, Edelman cast the dissenting vote, saying that Los Angeles, which would have to approve the landfill, has consistently opposed it. “To ask the city to permit a landfill there . . . seems a waste of time,” he said.

Dana would say only that his opposition to the landfill has not changed, but that his vote figures into behind-the-scenes negotiations between the county and the city over where new landfills will be placed.

Sources close to the negotiations said the supervisors want to keep the possibility of using the canyons as a landfill alive as a bargaining chip with the city.

The canyon area is one of six locations that sanitation experts say are technically best suited to be garbage dumps. Four of the others are on the northern rim of the San Fernando Valley or near Santa Clarita. The fifth is in Griffith Park.