Bill to Regulate Toxic Dumps on Indian Reservations Heads for Assembly Passage

The Senate on Friday approved a bill to allow state regulation of toxic waste dumps and landfills built on sovereign Indian lands such as the one proposed for Campo Reservation in southeast San Diego County.

The bill, sponsored by Assemblyman Steve Peace (D-Rancho San Diego), was passed 22 to 11 by the Senate and appeared headed for perfunctory approval in the Assembly late Friday before the end of the 1990 legislative session.

Peace’s measure was inspired by fears that a Campo Indian plan to build a 600-acre landfill on their reservation would be exempt from state control, although neighbors claimed it could leak into their ground water.

The Indians maintained that treaties and legal precedent leave them accountable to only the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the Bureau of Indian Affairs in building the private dump.

But Peace persuaded his colleagues in the Assembly and Senate that the notion of Indian sovereignty is only being used as a smoke screen for out-of-state waste disposal companies to get around stricter California environmental laws.

He and supporters of the bill argued that federal officials are lax at best in regulating the dumps, and that the state should impose its rules because Indian landfills could pose an environmental hazard to water and soil outside of reservation boundaries.

On Friday, Peace continued to predict that his bill will be challenged in court by Indian tribes. “The point of the bill is to get ourselves in the best position to win the litigation,” he said Friday.

Peace’s bill originally applied to all 117 Indian reservations and rancherias in California, but he changed that to win the support of Northern California legislators representing remote Indian lands. As passed Friday, it exempts Indian lands in 28 of the state’s 59 counties.

It also requires state regulation of a proposed landfill only if there is a finding that an Indian landfill could affect the environment or public health of those living outside of reservation boundaries.

“I’ve been able to work out the opposition with everybody in California, including San Diego-based operators competing for the Campo site,” Peace said. “That’s got to tell you something about why these other operators have resisted it. They have different intentions than the local guys have.”

He added that opposition from Indians on his bill was “extorted” by out-of-town waste disposal companies who said they would withdraw their offers to build private landfills on the reservations if the bill passed.

In the Campo case, the landfill represents a concerted effort by the small tribe to lift itself out of poverty, tribal representatives have said.