Oxnard’s Burning of Beach Debris Kindles Criticism

City crews began burning beach debris Friday, a move criticized by some environmentalists, who said the coastline fires are bad for the air and send the wrong message.

A better strategy, environmentalists said, is that used by the city of Ventura, which recycled to rid its beaches of about 2,000 tons of driftwood and other debris.

“Public agencies need to lead the way, and the city of Oxnard, I applaud them a great deal for many things, but this is a case where they clearly missed the mark,” said Neil Moyer, president of the Ventura County Environmental Coalition.

Cities up and down the coast have been working to get rid of the piles of wood and other matter washed onto their shores after winter and spring storms.

While burning the debris may be expedient, Moyer said, the smoke could create health problems. In addition, he said, it sets a poor example.

“I guess the point is that unless cities like Oxnard get with the program and do recycling like Ventura did, it will make it very difficult for people [who recycle] to continue on,” Moyer said.

Work crews on Friday burned about 20 tons of driftwood, leaving smoldering piles near the Mandalay Beach resort. The process is expected to take three weeks, depending on wind conditions.

Conditions Friday were favorable and should have caused little impact, said Mallory Ham, a meteorologist for the county’s Air Pollution Control District.

Without low-hanging clouds and with a steady breeze, the smoke rose high into the air and easily dispersed into the atmosphere, he said.

Oxnard city planner Matthew Winegar said he wasn’t aware of the method used in Ventura, but “for us, we felt it was a lot of volume and it would be much more costly to send it to the landfill.”

He added that much of the material is not suitable for mulching because objects such as bottles, lawn chairs and couches were washed down from the orchards and the Santa Clara River, and it was too difficult to sort them out.

The debris will be burned in relatively small piles over the three-week period, Winegar said, and the piles will be moved away from residences.

Ham said the city’s output represents a fraction of the burning that goes on all year on the county’s agricultural lands.

“It’s a fraction of what the ag people burn, so there’s no noticeable impact in the environment,” Ham said. “So it’s an appropriate method based on what’s acceptable in the county.”

After the storms, Gov. Pete Wilson issued a proclamation suspending some health and safety rules so the large quantities of beach debris could be burned, Ham said.

But, Moyer said, “I would think that giving deference to public health and safety, they would have elected not to burn.”

Ventura opted for another way to get rid its debris, which was piled so high after the storms that the view of the water at ground level was obstructed. City crews removed about 2,000 tons of debris from the shoreline between Surfers Point and the Ventura Harbor, according to Santa Paula-based L&H; Consulting, which helped coordinate cleanup efforts.

Crews hauled material to be recycled by California Wood Recycling in Ventura from mid-March to the end of April.

Residents were also invited on three occasions--dubbed “Wood Stack ‘98”--to take their four-wheel drive vehicles on the beach to haul away wood for their own use.

The cleanup efforts cost more than $320,000, said Ventura Park Manager Mike Montoya.

The city elected not to burn the wood because that would have created significant odor and smoke, he said. In addition, the semi-wet material would have smoldered a long time, he said.

“We have a lot of people close to the beach and we would have had a lot of complaints,” Montoya said.

“When you take all the costs, burning probably would be cheaper, but given the environmental consequences we didn’t think it would be appropriate,” Montoya said. “So yes, recycling does require a larger dollar commitment, but we thought it was important.”