Recycling Center Is Approved : Waste: Oxnard will put a down payment on land for the $20-million facility, expected to be the largest in the county.

While other Ventura County cities have abandoned the idea of building a regional waste-sorting center, Oxnard has struck out on its own, agreeing Tuesday to spend $2.9 million for land on which to erect its own facility.

City Council members unanimously voted to put a $500,000 down payment on a 16.5-acre parcel at the southwest corner of Sturgis Road and Del Norte Boulevard in east Oxnard.

The rest of the money, due in six months, will be financed through the sale of bonds. The city will also finance construction of the project.

When completed, perhaps as soon as mid-1995, the $20-million recycling and waste-transfer station will be the largest facility of its kind in the county, capable of handling up to 2,780 tons of solid waste daily.

“We do not want to stay with the old traditional methods of building more and more landfills to put our trash (in),” Mayor Manuel Lopez said after the council vote.

Faced with shrinking landfill space and a state mandate that cities recycle 25% of their garbage by 1995, city and county officials conducted an 18-month review of a proposal to build a plant that would sort recyclables and haul trash generated by west county residents.

During that time, Oxnard competed with Gold Coast Recycling Inc. of Ventura to build the regional center, known as a materials recovery facility.

But last month, the Ventura County Waste Commission decided to abandon pursuit of such a regional facility.

Waste commissioners “decided that it would not be cost-effective at this point to proceed with this multimillion-dollar facility,” said Kay Martin, the county’s director of solid waste management. “Oxnard, from what I can understand, feels that this is a facility that they themselves need to attain their diversion goals.”

Those goals are laid out in a state law that forces every county and city to cut the amount of waste sent to landfills 25% by 1995 and 50% by the year 2000.

County waste officials believe those goals can be met by establishing programs that recycle leaves, grass clippings and other so-called green waste.

But in Oxnard, where 60% of the waste is generated by industry and business, officials say those goals cannot be attained through green waste recycling.

“Our waste stream is less than 16% green waste. We can’t do it with green waste,” said Councilman Andres Herrera, the city’s representative on the county Waste Commission. “Oxnard is the largest waste generator in Ventura County and we have to protect the integrity of our rate payers. We are taking our obligation seriously.”

Los Angeles-based BLT Enterprises has won permission to build and operate the 150,000-square-foot facility in Oxnard.

At the center, recyclables will be separated from trash, with refuse being transferred by rail to a landfill. The facility will feature a place where residents can sell recyclables and a collection center for household hazardous wastes.

The plant eventually will operate around the clock, seven days a week, and will employ 240 people.

Despite the Waste Commission’s decision, Oxnard leaders remain hopeful that officials in other cities will chose to use the waste-transfer and recycling center after it is built.

“I think the other cities that have been reluctant to come with us will eventually join,” Lopez said. “After all, we are the only show on the road.”