Santa Clarita Council Votes Against Dump : Confrontation: Armed with new legal advice, the city takes a stand before completion of an environmental review of the Elsmere Canyon landfill plan.

Breaking sharply from its earlier wait-and-see stance, the Santa Clarita City Council has voted unanimously to oppose a plan by the city and county of Los Angeles to open a landfill at nearby Elsmere Canyon.

Council members previously said they would remain neutral on the issue until the landfill’s environmental review was completed. But revised advice from the Santa Clarita city attorney and increasing community pressure prompted the council to take a stand against the dump at Tuesday night’s meeting.

“We did not know that was going to happen last night, and we were pretty surprised,” Marsha McLean, chairwoman of the Elsmere Canyon Preservation Committee, said Wednesday. “We’ve been pushing for this for some time.”

Council members had been advised previously that taking a position against the dump before completion of the environmental review would undermine their case if they were to file a subsequent legal challenge to the review’s findings.

“We received a new legal opinion,” Councilman Howard P. (Buck) McKeon said of Tuesday’s vote to oppose the dump. “Our attorney felt we could do that and not prejudice our position if we do have to take legal action.”

Citing the confidential relationship between attorneys and their clients, Santa Clarita City Attorney Carl K. Newton declined to discuss what advice he had given the council regarding Elsmere Canyon.

McKeon said prior to Tuesday’s meeting that council members, as individuals, had opposed the plan to place a garbage dump just outside the Santa Clarita city limits, about two miles northeast of the interchange of the Antelope Valley and Golden State freeways. “Now it’s an official position,” McKeon said.

Critics of the proposed landfill have charged that it will create traffic jams and lead to local air and water pollution. The 2,000-acre dump site is at a higher altitude than the city, and Santa Clarita residents say drainage from the dump could foul their underground water supplies.

The council did not allocate any money Tuesday for a court battle against the dump, but City Manager George Caravalho said he will use city reserve funds to work with local water agencies to study the dump’s impact on ground water and to organize community opponents of the landfill.

“This is the catalyst that starts the forward march to protect this city against what we perceive as an environmental threat,” Mayor Jo Anne Darcy said.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Deane Dana, a key proponent of new landfills, said the county will proceed with the Elsmere Canyon project despite the Santa Clarita City Council’s opposition.

“We’re disappointed, but the county will continue to move ahead with preparations” for the dump, Dana said through a spokesman. “The needs of the county as a whole dictate that additional landfill capacity be developed, and Elsmere is regarded as an outstanding location. We would, of course, have liked to have the city of Santa Clarita’s participation.”

County and city officials have negotiated a tentative agreement to open the landfill, possibly as early as 1995.

Ron Deaton, a Los Angeles city legislative analyst who has been involved in the landfill talks, declined to comment on Santa Clarita’s opposition to the project.

He said the city of Los Angeles has not given final approval to the project. “The decision whether to proceed or not is dependent on the outcome of the environmental review,” he said.

Santa Clarita Councilwoman Jan Heidt, who proposed Tuesday’s landfill vote, complained that Los Angeles city and county officials have not involved Santa Clarita leaders in their planning for the Elsmere dump.

“They don’t let us in on what they’re doing,” she said. “This is something that is not good for the Santa Clarita Valley. I think the community expects us to keep it out of here.”

At a public forum in January that drew more than 200 residents, Santa Clarita council members heard overwhelming community opposition to the proposed landfill. With Tuesday’s vote, the council rejected a tentative county proposal that called for Santa Clarita to refrain from opposing the landfill in exchange for various concessions, including a $1-million annual share of dump fees.