Sludge Watch ==> Kern : Rural County Rejects Big City Sludge on Farmland

[maureen.reilly at sympatico.ca]

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/northern_california/14764254.htm

San Jose Mercury News

Rural county rejects big city sewage on farmland
JULIANA BARBASSA
Associated Press


BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - Urban centers in Southern California will have to find 
some other place to dump their sewage after their rural neighbors to the 
north voted overwhelmingly to stop them from spreading treated human waste 
on farmland.

Each year, Kern County's open fields take in over 450,000 tons of treated 
human waste trucked from Los Angeles and other urban centers. The mixture is 
spread on land used to grow cattle feed.

While some residents swore by it, saying the sludge has no pathogens after 
treatment and works well as fertilizer, other residents worried that the 
unsavory mixture could seep into the region's water, increase air pollution 
or taint the name of Kern's $3.5 billion agricultural industry, though 
sludge is never applied to crops consumed by humans.

Critics prevailed, with 82.69 percent of county voters saying they don't 
want sludge applied to their land anymore.

"It's time to start cleaning up our back yard, and the first step is to get 
neighbors to stop throwing stuff over the fence," said Larry Pearson, 
councilman for the rural farming town of Wasco.

Pearson was a fierce advocate of the measure. About 15 miles from Wasco a 
1,280-acre sludge application site owned by the city of Oxnard takes in 
24,000 tons of treated waste a year.

The practice of using treated waste as fertilizer took off in the early 
1990s when U.S. Environmental Protection Agency decided that applying 
treated sewage to farmland as fertilizer was preferable to sending it out to 
sea or pouring it in landfills.

Kern County's vast expanse of inexpensive land and its location, just across 
the Tehachapi mountains from the Los Angeles basin, made it an attractive 
option.

But residents in the area resented being seen as a dumping ground. A picture 
of a two-story outhouse, the top labeled "L.A. County" and the bottom 
labeled "Kern County" illustrated the Web site for the campaign to pass 
Measure E, and likely represented the feelings of many in the region.

"This county's been under siege, taking in one-third of California's 
sludge," said Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter. "They're finally taking their 
well-being into their own hands."

Now the urban areas that chose Kern's land as a solution for their waste 
management problems and invested money in the scheme are scrambling for an 
alternative.

Los Angeles has been sending about two dozen tanker trucks of sewage a day 
to Kern County since 1994. In 2000, it spent $9.3 million to buy Green 
Acres, the 4,688-acre farm where it was applying its waste.

In 2000, when Kern County decided to take only sludge that's been cooked at 
high temperatures to kill pathogens, the city invested another $40 million 
into its treatment system to comply.

It was costly, but all other options are even more expensive, said Diane 
Gilbert Jones, with Los Angeles' sanitation department.

"We are looking at technologies that are not readily available, at 
continuing to land-apply in other areas, farther away," she said. "We're not 
closing our minds to anything."

Cities and counties have six months to comply with the measure, or face 
fines of $500 a day.

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