Operator of Dumps Names New Chairman

Houston investor Harry J. Phillips Jr., American Ecology Corp.’s chief executive and biggest stockholder, has also been named its chairman. The company, formerly based in Agoura Hills, said it also moved its headquarters to Houston.

The operator of toxic waste dumps declared a 3-for-2 stock split, payable to shareholders of record June 15, which will increase the company’s total shares outstanding to 7.2 million from 4.8 million.

Phillips, 42, succeeded William E. Prachar, 46, as chairman. Prachar will remain the company’s vice chairman. At American Ecology’s recent annual meeting, its shareholders elected three additional directors, increasing its board to nine members.

A former executive of waste management giant Browning-Ferris Industries Inc., Phillips took a management role at American Ecology after his investor group bought 52% of the company from Browning-Ferris for $16.6 million. Phillips now controls about 36% of American Ecology’s voting stock, the company said.

American Ecology has enjoyed rising profits in recent quarters. In the quarter that ended March 31, its earnings more than doubled from a year earlier, to $1.93 million, on a 33% increase in revenue to $14.7 million.

But the company also faces problems with its newest project--a proposed dump for radioactive waste in Ward Valley in the Mojave Desert, 22 miles west of Needles near the juncture of the California, Nevada and Arizona borders.

Once expected to be open by now, the dump has yet to be licensed by the California Department of Health Services amid continued complaints from opponents who worry that the dump’s waste will leak into the environment. The company says it has met all of the state’s technical requirements but that the agency’s review continues.

Separately, American Ecology and other waste disposal concerns got a boost last week when the U. S. Supreme Court, in deciding two cases in Alabama and Michigan, made it harder for states to block the importation of hazardous wastes and garbage from other states.

The high court said such state barriers violate the constitutional protection of interstate commerce, and its rulings lifted the stock prices of American Ecology and other waste handling companies.