In World of Trash, He’s Tops

When Ben Evans was discharged from the Marine Corps, he desperately needed a job and was willing to start at the bottom.

After seven years as a landfill waste inspector for the county, he has risen approximately 800 feet above his humble beginnings.

As one would estimate the age of a tree by counting its rings, the 29-year-old Rancho Santa Margarita resident measures his career by layers of garbage. The contents of each layer at the Bowerman landfill in Irvine have come under his scrutiny over the years. His job requires a never-ending search for hazardous waste, to be removed before all is covered with a blanket of dirt.

“That’s all trash,” Evans said, pointing to the man-made hillside as he drove his mud-splattered truck down the bumpy dirt road, approaching the new “pod” where an average of 860 trucks empty their loads each day.

Several workers direct traffic for a succession of trucks while huge, spiked-wheel bulldozers called compactors gather and push the garbage into the newly excavated site.

Nearby, earth-moving equipment called scrapers carve the surrounding bluffs of Irvine’s Bee Canyon to make room for the 1.7 million tons of trash dumped in the 725-acre landfill each year. Of the county’s three active landfills, Bowerman gets the most garbage. The landfill will be full by 2024 and turned into a park.

His job is not as bad as it seems, Evans explained.

“At first I was expecting to be coated with food and trash at the end of the day. It’s a lot cleaner than what most people expect. It’s really not that smelly. At least I don’t think so; but then I’ve been here for seven years.”

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After a year at the Prima Deshecha landfill in San Juan Capistrano, Evans was transferred in 1990 by the county’s Integrated Waste Management Department to the newly opened Bowerman landfill. With little more than a pair of work gloves and a garden hoe, he sifted through garbage about 800 feet below where he currently parks his truck. He is now the senior waste inspector, has his own cubicle, and supervises a staff of four.

But except for a handful of administrative duties, the job is still the same: to identify and remove paint, pesticides, motor oil and other toxic materials that could contaminate the soil and underlying ground water.

“Ten years ago, they didn’t have waste inspectors. I remember the old-time operators telling how trucks could come and dump whatever they wanted. They didn’t really have any regulations,” he said. “We’re mandated now by the state to be out here inspecting trash.”

Evans and his crew collect about 500 gallons of hazardous waste every 90 days, in addition to things like asbestos ceiling tiles and fluorescent light fixtures which contain PCBs. The materials are then transported to various hazardous waste disposal facilities. By spot checking truck loads before they’re dumped, another 500 gallons of toxic substances are turned away every three months.

Bowerman is a commercial landfill and is not open to the general public, but workers there do play host to the occasional exasperated visitor.

“We get some people in here who look like they’re about to pull their hair out because they threw something away by mistake. If they don’t know which truck it was--it’s gone. But some people have tracked down the truck and we’ve helped them sift through the trash. It’s about a 50-50 chance--some people find what they’re looking for and some people don’t.”

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When a wedding ring or a wallet full of cash is mistakenly tossed away, some residents have wisely called their disposal company to track down the truck that collected their garbage, Evans said.

If the truck has not already dumped its load, they meet the truck at the landfill. The contents are unloaded in an isolated area and the search begins. By using the resident’s house number, the driver can usually pinpoint what section of the load should be searched.

“A lady came in who’d lost her wallet and was about to go on vacation. She was really shaking. My co-worker found it. It was under a big bloop of gravy, but she grabbed that sucker really fast. She didn’t care what kind of stuff it was in. I think it was all cash. She was very thankful.”

But if landfill workers come across unidentified valuables, county regulations prohibit them from retrieving the items, Evans said.

“People will collect jars of pennies or change and they’ll throw them out. We just bury it. Angry wives who are mad at their husbands--maybe they’re getting divorced--sometimes they throw out all their jewelry or their husband’s coin collection. We can’t do anything with it. It has to be buried. I’ve seen boxes of live kittens that were thrown away. We’ll take them and protect them. Sooner or later, it seems like we get almost everything.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Profile: Ben Evans

Age: 29

Hometown: Vail, Colo.

Residence: Rancho Santa Margarita

Family: Wife, Rachael; 4-year-old son

Education: Bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from University of Chadwick (Alabama)

Background: Four years in Marine Corps as nuclear, biological and chemical warfare specialist; joined county’s Integrated Waste Management Department as landfill waste inspector in 1990; currently senior waste inspector at Irvine’s Bowerman landfill

On waste watching: “We get about 7,000 tons of trash a day. We just walk up and down through the trash and try to keep an eye out for signs of hazardous materials. One paint can is probably going to get by us--we can’t look at everything. We’re looking for the big quantities.”

Source: Ben Evans; Researched by RUSS LOAR / For The Times