Plan to Ship Waste to Remote Sites Dropped

Accusing Los Angeles officials of insincerity, a major trash hauler this week withdrew its proposal to export the city’s household garbage to landfills in remote areas, leaving the city with little alternative but to continue relying on a controversial San Fernando Valley dump.

In a letter Monday to the city Bureau of Sanitation, a Waste Management Inc. official -- Vice President Dan Shoener -- said bureaucratic delays in awarding the contract had caused the company to doubt Los Angeles’ commitment to exporting garbage as a way to close down Sunshine Canyon Landfill. The Granada Hills dump is owned by another large waste hauler, BFI.

“We believe the city is not sincere in wanting to pursue options to Sunshine Canyon,” Waste Management spokeswoman Kit Cole said Tuesday.

The Bureau of Sanitation and the mayor’s office disputed the allegation. “I don’t think the bureau was insincere in any way, shape or form,” said Sanitation Director Rita Robinson, adding that more than a year of delay came about because “we were gathering facts and answering questions.”

The contract would have been worth half a billion dollars over 15 years.

Waste Management had proposed to transport Los Angeles’ garbage to the Antelope Valley and Riverside County. But after waiting months for the city to move forward, the company said it needed to devote its landfill capacity to other cities.

“There’s a really high demand within the [Los Angeles] Basin for available space,” Cole said. “We felt that there was no end in sight for this process, and that Los Angeles didn’t and doesn’t have a long-term plan for dealing with its waste.”

Waste Management’s withdrawal disappointed an activist group that has been complaining for years about odor, noise, traffic and diesel fumes.

“Urban landfills are archaic,” said Wayde Hunter, president of North Valley Coalition and a member of the city’s Landfill Oversight Committee. “We have no business burying garbage in a city.”

Waste Management’s action leaves Los Angeles without an apparent alternative to using Sunshine Canyon in Granada Hills until at least 2011.

The city initially solicited bids to export garbage in September 2003. Waste Management was the only qualified bidder.

Although Mayor James K. Hahn and other city officials have pledged for years to close down the Sunshine Canyon facility, BFI intends to continue operating the dump 20 more years.

BFI District Manager Greg Loughnane said that if L.A. trash was shipped elsewhere, other cities would fill the void.