Sludge Watch ==> Sludge Dispute Grows - L.A. Sues Kern County

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_4187609

Article Last Updated: 8/15/2006 09:32 PM


Sludge dispute grows; L.A. sues Kern County

BY KERRY CAVANAUGH, Staff Writer
LA Daily News

To protect its $45 million investment in its sewage-treatment system, Los 
Angeles filed suit Tuesday against Kern County, where voters have banned the 
import of sludge on a city-owned farm.
Kern County residents voted overwhelmingly in June to prohibit Los Angeles 
from trucking biosolids - or treated sewage waste - to city-owned Green 
Acres Farm, where it is spread on the ground as fertilizer. The vote means 
that in January, Los Angeles will have to send 750 tons of biosolids daily 
to Arizona or elsewhere at an extra $21 million a year.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court alleges Kern County is violating 
state and federal laws by banning the legal application of an organic 
fertilizer.

"We are simply seeking to protect both the economic investment in our 
biosolids reuse program, our Green Acres Farm in Kern County, and the right 
of all citizens and municipalities to transport and use lawful products on 
their own property, wherever it may be," said Cynthia Ruiz, president of the 
Los Angeles Board of Public Works.

Joining in the lawsuit are the sanitation districts of Orange and Los 
Angeles counties, which also send some treated sewage sludge to Kern County, 
and farmers and trucking interests.

The city paid $9.6 million for Green Acres Farm in 2000, then spent $35 
million to upgrade its sewage-treatment system to meet Kern County's tough 
environmental standards.

However, Kern County leaders have opposed L.A.'s use of biosolids and fear 
that pharmaceuticals and heavy metals _ illegally dumped into the city's 
sewer system _ could eventually seep into the drinking water supply beneath 
the farm.

The campaign to ban L.A.'s biosolids was also fed by public perception that 
urban L.A. was using the San Joaquin Valley as a dumping ground.

David Price, director of the Kern County Resource Management Agency, said he 
was disappointed that Los Angeles wants to spend taxpayer dollars to 
overturn the will of a community.

"You have 83 percent of (Kern County) voters who said they don't want this 
practice, and the city is in the position of trying to bully us into 
continuing the practice."

But Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation Director Rita Robinson said the city's 
farm and use of biosolids as a fertilizer is safe, and noted that other 
cities in Kern continue to use biosolids because the ban doesn't apply to 
them.

"Biosolids have only improved the environment in Kern County, and there is 
no basis for this ban."

kerry.cavanaugh at dailynews.com

(213) 978-0390