State OKs Plans for Expanded Toland Dump

Plans for an expanded Toland Road landfill won a final round of approval before a state board Tuesday, but opponents vow to seek a legal order preventing the landfill’s scheduled Aug. 26 opening.

Meeting in Ukiah, the California Integrated Waste Management Board voted unanimously to approve the facility permit sought by the Ventura Regional Sanitation District. It is the last of three regulatory agencies, including the county and Regional Water Quality Control Board, to approve permits needed to expand the dump.

The decision means the landfill, between Santa Paula and Fillmore in the rural Santa Clara Valley, will become the main repository for west county trash when Oxnard’s Bailard Landfill reaches capacity and closes next month--unless an injunction is granted prohibiting landfill operations.

Lawsuits challenging the project’s key environmental document are not scheduled to go to court until October, so landfill opponents are trying to get an injunction to prevent a newly expanded Toland from opening before the lawsuits can be heard.

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Fillmore Councilwoman Linda Brewster said the council July 23 gave its lawyers permission to file a request for an injunction, if necessary.

“We will take it as far as we can to try and stop this thing,” Brewster said. “We think it’s the county’s responsibility and they need to look at this further.”

Santa Paula Mayor John Melton said the council there has yet to approve filing the injunction request.

But the landfill’s backers Tuesday downplayed the likelihood that an injunction would be granted.

“This is a project that has won on its merits,” said Mark Zirbel, the sanitation district’s lawyer. “We’re confident [opponents] will not obtain an injunction. There’s no good reason to enjoin the operation of a project that has now been evaluated and approved by every regulatory agency. . . . We don’t believe a court is going to stop the operation of a landfill in that circumstance.”

Valley residents and farmers have bitterly fought the project, citing such negative effects as ground-water contamination and increased noise, traffic and dust they said would result from allowing a fivefold expansion of the landfill’s capacity over the next 30 years. Landfill supporters have said the Toland site would do less harm to the environment than any other alternative.

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Three lawsuits--by the two cities, a consortium of local property owners and the Santa Clara Elementary School District whose historic one-room schoolhouse is at Toland Road and California 126--have been filed against the project.

They are expected to be consolidated into one lawsuit in August.

Opponents are also hoping that concerns about an earthquake fault cutting across the landfill site will result in a slimmed-down project they can live with.

The Regional Water Quality Control Board, though granting the landfill expansion a permit earlier this month, has asked for further study into whether such a fault exists. If it does, the district would be required to deposit no trash within 200 feet of the fault, possibly diminishing the landfill’s size.

The district maintains that no fault exists. Opponents disagree.

Opponents on Tuesday acknowledged that their options are dwindling. Still, they say they do not intend to give up without a fight; an ice cream social to raise money for legal fees is scheduled in August.

“The breadth of the [playing] field is narrowing for sure,” said Gordon Kimball, a farmer and member of Ventura County Citizens to Stop Toland Landfill. “There’s still an earthquake fault. The fault is not going to go away.”

Meanwhile, sanitation district officials celebrated today’s action.

“Our timeline showed obtaining the last permit in the month of July 1996 and we have met that goal,” Zirbel said. “We have all our permits and we’re planning to open Aug. 26.”