Municipalities Fall Short in Effort to Cut Back on Trash

A landmark law intended to change the way California disposes of its garbage required all cities and counties to cut the trash they send to landfills by half this year.

But most municipalities, including those in Los Angeles County, are failing to meet that ambitious goal. And the much-feared Jan. 1, 2000 deadline, which was supposed to result in fines of as much as $10,000 a day for those that did not comply, has come and gone without consequence.

Considered a watershed in America’s recycling movement, the 1989 law known as the Integrated Waste Management Act has dramatically affected the way most Californians handle the heaps of garbage they produce.

It is directly responsible for the proliferation of curbside recycling programs, which allow residents to separate their bottles and cans, and compost programs, which let them keep their “green waste” out of the garbage bin.

And it has had significant results. The state board created to oversee the effort estimates that 37% of the state’s rubbish was diverted from landfills last year, compared with just 10% a decade earlier. Put in perspective, Californians have steered 140 million tons of their rubbish from dumps since 1990--enough to fill a line of garbage trucks that would circle the Earth four times.

Some cities are now above or near the 50% mark, including Los Angeles, which is keeping 47% of its trash away from the dump. But most are not quite meeting the mandate--and some are worried they will eventually pay for it.

County Sought to Soften Mandate

Los Angeles County, which is dumping only 31% less in landfills, was aggressively pushing legislation to soften the requirements, arguing that they had become more about “number crunching” and “bean counting” than a legitimate campaign to curb dumping in landfills.

But the bill by Assemblyman Edward Vincent (D-Inglewood), AB 1939, met opposition from environmentalists and the Integrated Waste Management Board, the state panel created to oversee the law. It has all but hit the trash heap, stalled in the Assembly’s Natural Resources Committee.

“We’re obviously concerned that we have an exposure issue here,” said county lobbyist Dan Wall, who met last week with waste board members to seek a compromise.

Some critics wonder why the county would worry. Although cities and counties were also required to reduce the trash they take to landfills by 25% in 1995, dozens did not do so. Yet only four were fined--and one of those was later pardoned.

“I can’t for the life of me figure out why anyone would be concerned about fines, given the track record of the waste management board,” said Mark Murray of Californians Against Waste.

The waste board favors what it considers a more constructive approach to deal with cities and counties that appear doomed to fail. Or rather, with those that fail to make even a “good-faith effort” to hit the mark.

It usually places the more blatant offenders on special timetables, suggests specific recycling programs and issues compliance orders to get them on track. In Los Angeles County, 23 of the county’s 88 cities received such orders last fall, including Bell Gardens, Torrance, La Canada Flintridge and La Puente.

“This whole fear of fines is unfounded,” said waste board Chairman Dan Eaton, a capital insider and former political aide who was appointed to the panel by Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante two years ago when Bustamante was Assembly speaker. “If anything, we have been criticized for not being tough enough. But rather than fining everyone, we have favored a different approach.

“They all know in their heart of hearts that it is a long way before you ever get to that point” where fines are imposed, he said. “We’re going to do everything we can to help them so that they are not perceived as a scofflaw.”

Whether anything will ever happen to those who flunk the 50% trash test remains unclear. Although the 1989 law clearly states that Jan. 1, 2000 was the deadline to divert half of all waste from dumps, municipalities still have quite a bit of time before they feel the heat.

That is because the waste board plans to use reports covering all of 2000 to determine whether the cities and counties met the requirement, and is not requiring jurisdictions to turn in those reports until the middle of 2001.

Furthermore, the panel is so badly backlogged that it is still trying to make sense of locals’ diversion data from 1996. So it could be years before it officially determines who passed muster.

Adding to the lack of immediacy, the Legislature three years ago responded to complaints that the 2000 deadline was too tight by allowing the waste board to grant extensions of as much as five years. The bill was introduced by Sen. Byron Sher (D-Stanford), who had carried the original waste reduction legislation. The board now estimates that as many as 60% of the local jurisdictions will seek extensions.

However, the board has yet to set up procedures for determining who will qualify for them, frustrating Los Angeles County and numerous others that are complaining they need to know what the rules are before being asked to obey them.

Davis Criticized for Board Openings

Eaton considers that criticism unfounded, saying it is pretty clear what the law requires of local governments. But even the environmentalists who favor a crackdown on blatant violators concede that the municipalities have a point.

They accuse the six-member board of failing to get its act together--and Gov. Gray Davis of refusing to make a priority of filling its vacancies. The board had four members until recently, which meant a a unanimous vote was required for approval of even routine items.

Davis cut into that vacuum this month by adding another member, leaving just one slot open, the one reserved for environmentalists. But the person he chose--Jose Medina, the embattled former head of Caltrans whom Davis ousted from that job amid a whirlwind of controversy--only reaffirmed for critics of the panel that it is not something politicians take seriously. Medina will earn more than $113,000 a year.

“It made it clear what the governor thinks of this board,” one environmentalist groused. “It’s just a dumping ground.”