Trash Arrives as Opponents Stew : Expanded Toland Landfill Opens While Judge Studies Earthquake Claims

Despite an early morning attempt at sabotage by pouring glue into gate locks at Toland Landfill, trash trucks from throughout the county hauled tons of garbage into the canyon above the Santa Clara Valley on Monday.

Toland officials said about 1,000 tons of trash were dumped at the landfill on its first day of expanded operation, to the disappointment of nearby ranchers and city officials from Santa Paula and Fillmore who have opposed the potential tenfold increase in rubbish dumped there.

A judge is expected to rule Friday on whether to block the increased dumping until state officials determine if an active earthquake fault traverses the landfill, located midway between Santa Paula and Fillmore. Both cities, a school district and ranchers have sued to block the expansion.

On Monday, from 6 a.m. to late afternoon, trucks rumbled into the site, dumping the garbage from the west county’s two main waste recycling stations, Gold Coast Recycling in Ventura and Oxnard’s newly opened Del Norte regional facility. Gordon Kimball, an opponent of the expansion, kept a watchful eye on the operation by taking pictures from his red Chevrolet truck on a hill of his ranch above the dump.

“Obviously I’m disappointed to see it open,” said Kimball, an avocado rancher. “There is a lot of open trash out there and I’m just wondering when the birds will get there. They are still making a lot of dust out there, and we are very concerned about the dust.”

Gary Haden, a manager for the Ventura Regional Sanitation District, said the landfill operator is determined to keep the mountains of rubbish out of the open air. The trash will be covered every night with dirt before 6 p.m., he said.

This landfill, Haden said, would be different from the “open pit” at its predecessor as the west county’s main dump, the Bailard Landfill near Oxnard, which closed Saturday. Scavenging sea gulls gathered there to scrounge up their daily meals.

Haden said sanitation officials are doing their best to prevent the stench of garbage and dust from blowing toward ranches to the west of the dump. Working to cut that dust are the heavy clay-like dirt of the dump floor, 1,200 feet of crushed rock on the road used by garbage trucks and the easterly direction of the winds.

“We want to be the best possible neighbor to these ranchers as we can,” added Orvene Carpenter, chairman of the Regional Sanitation District.

By 5 p.m., 124 vehicles had rumbled to the landfill and dumped more than 910 tons of rubbish.

Conspicuously absent was trash from Santa Paula, where Mayor John Melton said the city will take its trash to Chiquito Canyon Landfill east of Fillmore in Los Angeles County until Friday’s ruling.

Joining Santa Paula and Fillmore in their suit against Ventura County and the sanitation district, are the Santa Clara Elementary School District and a group of Santa Clara Valley ranchers and growers. They contend that the project’s environmental study is inadequate.

Opponents are concerned about the possibility that two earthquake faults run through the landfill, although sanitation district studies conclude that at least one fault line does not extend into the landfill.

The extra dumping will increase the landfill by 33 acres to 86, making it half the size of Bailard, Haden said.

The dump would not be full for 31 years, until a maximum of 12 million tons of garbage has been deposited, transforming the canyon into a mountain. The problem of what to do with trash is much larger than the current lawsuits and controversy, Haden said.

“California is the fourth highest producer of trash in the world,” Haden said. “[Landfills] are like time capsules. Everything that we know and throw away as a society is right here. There are no secrets.”

Indeed, on its first day of operation, volumes of trash exceeded expectations at the Del Norte regional facility. Officials were expecting about 700 tons but by early afternoon had more than 1,000 tons.

“It was very good today,” said Ruben Mesa, Oxnard’s waste manager. “We are very satisfied.”