East County Fears Trash Influx From West at Simi Valley Dump : Waste: Officials say the death of proposed Weldon landfill may bring a flood of garbage, especially if Bailard site closes.

The death of a proposal to build a new county landfill at Weldon Canyon in western Ventura County means that more trash probably will wind up in the Simi Valley Landfill, east county officials said last week.

For some time, officials in Simi Valley, Moorpark and Thousand Oaks have worried that west county cities would start dumping their trash at the Simi Valley site if the Weldon project failed.

Trash trucks from seven west county cities would clog east county roads, pollute the air and cut short the Simi Valley Landfill’s projected 18- to 20-year life span, the officials argued.

Last week, the tension rose another notch when the Ventura County Board of Supervisors denied a delay in the Weldon Canyon hearing process, and Waste Management of North America responded by withdrawing its Weldon Canyon proposal.

With Bailard Landfill near Ventura due to close Dec. 7 and Toland Road Landfill in Santa Paula too small to handle the west county’s trash, Simi Valley Landfill, also run by Waste Management, would be the only operating large-scale landfill left in the county.

East county officials said they put little faith in the west county cities’ efforts to pursue alternatives, such as keeping Bailard open, reducing trash production by building recycling plants or finding cheap landfill space outside Ventura County.

So the Moorpark City Council voted Wednesday night to protest west county trash dumping already going on at the Simi Valley Landfill, which Moorpark contends violates the terms of the dump’s permit.

Thousand Oaks Mayor Judy Lazar also said last week that she would urge the City Council to fight any expansion of west county dumping at the Simi Valley Landfill.

And Simi Valley Councilman Bill Davis vowed Thursday to urge his fellow council members to sue for a court injunction blocking any attempts to bring more west county trash to the Simi Valley Landfill.

“The bottom line is that would certainly be the next move,” Davis said of the prospect of west county trash coming east.

The supervisors should have agreed to put off county Planning Commission hearings on Weldon Canyon until they had fully explored the alternatives, he said.

“You don’t kill the one thing that gives you an option,” said Davis, who represents his city on the county Solid Waste Commission. “It’s like saying ‘I’m going to go out and get a new car in six months, so I’ll blow a hole in the oil pan of the old one.’ Until you find a mechanism for disposing of your trash, you should not kill the one option.”

Moorpark City Councilman Scott Montgomery agreed, and said that west county trash generators have already begun leaning improperly on the Simi Valley Landfill.

The Ventura-based Gold Coast Recycling Center sends about 81 tons per day of non-recyclable trash to the Simi Valley Landfill.

This, he said, violates the environmental impact report approved by the county during the permitting process, a document based on the assumption that trash dumped at the landfill would come only from Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks and Moorpark.

The council voted Wednesday to write the county Resource Management Agency and the state Integrated Waste Management Board, asking them to order west county haulers to stop dumping trash in the Simi landfill until a revised EIR can be prepared.

“It seems that the east county is being looked at as the trash dumping ground for the county,” Montgomery said during the council meeting. “It is the responsibility of western Ventura County to handle their trash, whatever that takes.”

Montgomery then turned to the looming Dec. 7 closure deadline for Bailard Landfill.

“I’ve been yelling wolf for about a year now, and I’ve taken every abuse and nasty comments and even been accused of election-year politicking,” he said. “And now we sit here, five months from the day of infamy.”

But Supervisor Vicky Howard said the east county officials are becoming unduly alarmed.

The Board of Supervisors’ approval of the Ventura Regional Sanitation District’s application to keep Bailard Landfill open until 1996 “could very definitely happen,” she said.

County trash planners also are exploring the cost of hauling trash to the Chiquito Canyon Landfill near Santa Clarita or loading it onto trains bound for a dump in East Carbon, Utah, she said.

Howard added: “There are plenty of alternatives . . . but I do not anticipate there is going to be any big shift in landfill use to Simi Valley.”

Thousand Oaks Councilman Alex Fiore also dismissed Davis’ and Montgomery’s reactions.

“I don’t foresee the effects on east county being severe because I feel confident that the supervisors will grant the extension on Bailard,” Fiore said. “Bailard could handle refuse in west county for at least three more years. By that time we’ll have found a more suitable site.”

Fiore said he would never support trucking west county trash to the Simi Valley Landfill, but he said of the other officials’ concerns, “Somewhere along the line, they ought to have the confidence that the board will do what’s right.”

Whatever is planned, the Simi Valley Landfill is ready and willing to take more trash.

Michael E. Williams, who oversees Waste Management’s Ventura County operations, said the company welcomes an opportunity to increase the landfill’s trash flow and cash income, from the current rate of about 800 tons per day to a rate closer to its permitted capacity of 3,000 tons per day.

And Kay Martin, solid waste coordinator for the county, said in an interview last week that while her office is exploring all the alternatives, “I don’t know if they can prevent waste from the west county from flowing to the east county.”