Tentative OK Given for New Dump Sites

Nearing an end to a years-long debate over septic waste disposal in Los Angeles, the City Council on Wednesday gave tentative approval to a program establishing four citywide dump sites.

The move helps alleviate pressure on a site within the Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant--the only site previously approved for septic waster disposal--and to help eliminate illegal dumping in other areas.

The council voted 13 to 1 in favor of establishing three permanent sites--at Tillman, in downtown Los Angeles on Mesquite Street and near Los Angeles International Airport, and an interim site on Tujunga Avenue in Sun Valley--to receive septic waste.

The city’s Bureau of Sanitation is evaluating several sites in the northeast Valley for a fourth permanent location, officials said.

The Valley will still bear the brunt of the hauls, since the Tillman and Tujunga Avenue receptacles will be open 40 hours per week, as opposed to 21 hours at the LAX and Mesquite Street sites.

The council will review the issue once more when an ordinance comes before it to establish fee schedules for waste haulers.

Companies hauling waste are expected to pay an annual $2,000 truck permit fee, as well as volumetric discharge fees--.0496 cents per gallon for waste generated outside the city and .0256 cents for that generated within city borders.

Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski, whose district includes the Tillman plant, said it took the city too long to come to a conclusion on the program.

She added that this plan balances the interests of the city and its residents, as well as the haulers.

But Councilwoman Laura Chick, the lone dissenter, said she would not vote for a plan that included Tillman because it is situated within the Sepulveda Basin, which she said should be protected.

Officials said the Tillman site will not be opened until an access road is built to take trucks away from the recreation areas.