Water Board OKs Landfill Expansion

The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board’s approval Thursday of expanding the Sunshine Canyon Landfill into Granada Hills ended a decade-long battle.

The water board, which imposed strict regulations to ensure public health and water quality, sought to find common ground for contentious residents, politicians and the landfill operators before voting four to two for the expansion.

The board’s action was the last major hurdle that landfill owner Browning-Ferris Industries had to clear in its plan to develop a 450-acre landfill within the Los Angeles city limits in the north San Fernando Valley.

The project must now win permits with far less stringent requirements from the city of Los Angeles, the state Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers before construction can begin.

In making its decision, the water board stipulated that BFI must install a high-density polyethylene and clay liner system that will exceed federal standards. In addition, the panel agreed to review, amend or possibly revoke permits if there is sufficient evidence that the landfill poses a risk to public health or water quality.

“The board took a reasoned and comprehensive approach,” said Chairwoman Susan Cloke after the morning hearing at Simi Valley City Hall.

“The board can be proud that, as the result of our efforts, the county conducted a health-effects study, the city expanded its recycling efforts and the board’s staff did an excellent job in creating the strongest possible protection for the community in the development of landfills,” she said.

In voting to support the expansion plan, board member H. David Nahai said that the protracted deliberations in the last four months had been an “agonizing procedure because we have seen the pain of the community.”

Neighboring residents have expressed concern that the landfill has generated pollutants that may have caused cancer, birth abnormalities, miscarriages, respiratory illnesses and other health issues in the community

Nahai said he did not want community residents to interpret the board’s approval of an expanded landfill as a lack of consideration of their health-related concerns.

“We have not denied their side of the story,” he said. “But we have left the door open” for review of their claims, should they be supported by epidemiological studies.

Thursday’s decision was a compromise for the landfill operator, politicians and community residents who have engaged in a long-running debate over the landfill expansion proposal.

“I assumed that the board was going to approve, but I am glad that they went for the double liner,” said Wayde Hunter, president of North Valley Coalition, which opposed the expansion.

The board stipulated that BFI must install a so-called double liner, which consists of two 60-millimeter polyethylene sheets and two 2-foot layers of clay, to prevent contaminants from seeping into groundwater. Federal environmental law requires landfills to include one 60-millimeter polyethylene sheet and one 2-foot layer of clay, officials said.

The activism of the North Valley Coalition played a major role in keeping the expansion project in politicians’ sights.

Several elected officials objected to the expansion, including Mayor James K. Hahn, City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo, Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, Assemblyman Keith Richman (R-Northridge) and Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks).

Hahn has pledged a “landfill-free city by 2006” and has supported a policy stating that, once existing waste-disposal contracts expire, the city will end the dumping of trash in any landfill within Los Angeles, which would include Sunshine Canyon when it has expanded.

City Council members Cindy Miscikowski, Jan Perry, Bernard C. Parks and Ed Reyes support an expanded landfill.

They say that the City Council has made specific findings that the landfill would be an environmentally sound, cost-effective means of providing long-term, solid-waste disposal for city residents.

But Councilman Greig Smith, who represents the area, has challenged the expansion plan on several fronts, including potential health risks, susceptibility of the polyethylene and clay liners to stress cracks and the possibility of hazardous chemicals in wastewater discharged from the landfill.

Smith said, however: “I am delighted that they have taken the extraordinary action of requiring a double liner and for the additional requirements to reopen and revoke the permits.”

David Edwards, project director for BFI, said company executives were pleased with the board’s decision.