Oxnard Will Truck More Recyclable Garbage to Center

Oxnard’s City Council agreed Tuesday to start sending more of its recyclable trash to a recycling center rather than dumping it at the Bailard Landfill as a way to cut costs.

The council instructed staff on Tuesday to negotiate with Gold Coast Recycling Center in Ventura to increase the daily amount of recyclable trash that Oxnard sends there from two to 10 tons per day.

The council’s decision came in the wake of reports that four to 10 tons of recyclable waste from Oxnard businesses and apartments is being dumped daily into Bailard Landfill to avoid the higher costs of taking loads to the recycling center.

City officials said they hope to complete negotiations with Gold Coast by early October. The City Council would vote on the contract at that time.

The council also instructed staff to prepare a report outlining how much of the city’s recyclable materials end up in the landfill and how much money the city is saving by not sending all of its recyclable materials to Gold Coast.

“I’m quite disturbed that our staff is leading the public and this council to believe that it is doing the best possible job in recycling, and then I learn through a newspaper that we have not been complying with--if not the law--then the spirit of the law,” said Councilman Michael Plisky before ordering the report.

State law mandates that cities reduce landfill use by 25% by the year 2000.

Oxnard Recycling Coordinator Stan Hakes said the city would gradually reduce its use of Bailard Landfill as soon as the truckloads being picked up become richer in recyclables.

Most of the loads being picked up contain about 60% non-recyclable waste, he said. Unless about two-thirds of the loads can be recycled, the cost of taking them to the recycling center will remain too high, Hakes said.

The city uses Gold Coast to process about two tons of recyclables a day collected from its curbside recycling program in residential neighborhoods, which covers 3,000 homes.

The rest of the 10 to 30 tons of recyclable waste that Oxnard collects comes from commercial sources and apartment complexes, and is not usually separated as neatly as materials set aside by residents of single-family homes.

The commercial loads are taken to Bailard. At the landfill, some recyclables are sorted at a resource recovery station.

But because of space constraints and the station’s limited processing capabilities, as much as half of the recyclable loads that come to Bailard are simply buried in the landfill, city and Ventura County sanitation officials said last week.

To provide 10 tons a day of recyclable-rich loads to Gold Coast, Hakes said the city will double its curbside program next month and launch a public education campaign to teach businesses and apartments residents how to do a better job separating recyclables from other trash.

The contract also calls for Oxnard to deliver 20 tons a day after 12 months to the Gold Coast recycling center. By that time, city officials expect to have a citywide curbside recycling program for 26,000 houses.

“We’re working real hard on our recycling program,” Oxnard Refuse Coordinator John Zaragoza told the council. “I want the public to hear that.”