Sludge Watch ==> Sewage sludge battle 'righteous fight'

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

Measure E does NOT ban the importation of sewage sludge into Kern County!  
This
editorial is inaccurate.  Measure E bans the land application of sewage 
sludge
on the unincorporated lands of Kern County.

It is important for the public to understand this distinction, since banning
imported sludge would truly violate the Commerce Clause, but banning land
application of all sludge within Kern County's jurisdiction should not be
considered a violation of the Commerce Clause since all sludge - whatever 
origin
- would be treated equally.

Sludge could be brought to Kern for processing...landfill....or other use or
disposal under Measure E - just not land application.


I wonder why several news stories get this issue so very wrong.  I am 
starting to conclude
that some people find it more interesting to arouse sludge oppositon through 
the natural
antipathy rural people have for the evils of the big city, and the 
understandable opposition to
waste in general.

But the public needs to be educated as to the real health and environmental 
evils of sludge.
Public officials need  to look at the fact that there are better ways to 
manage our sanitation then to
mix toilet and industrial wastes and then smear them on 'farms'.  To this 
point the wastewater/sewage industry has been working hard to stop any 
research on the health impacts of sludge spreading...in the tradition that 
by failing to document and investigate health problems they can carry on 
their 'haul and dump' practices.

More focus on the actual sludge practices in Kern County will reveal that 
the sludge being spread is not always 'Class A' and violates the other, 
original County ordinance.  Better enforcement would go a long way to 
arresting the worst sludge practices.


........................

Bakersfield Californian
Editorials

Sewage sludge battle 'righteous fight'
Wednesday, Aug 16 2007
The only thing "green" about the way the city of Los Angeles gets rid of its 
sludge is "money."

The city and its mayor who says he wants to be known as environmentally 
sensitive, or "green" are only thinking about "money" when they haul about 
65 million gallons of sludge a year to Kern County, where it is smeared onto 
the land.

It's the cheapest way for Los Angeles to get rid of the goo it scoops from 
the bottom of its sewage treatment plants. It used to dump it into the 
ocean. But the federal Environmental Protection Agency ordered the city to 
stop because it was killing the fish.

So now the witch's brew of human waste flushed from the city's toilets, 
chemicals and drugs tossed down the sink, and Lord-knows-what wastes from 
industrial plants, is hauled to Kern County.

A steady caravan of trucks haul about 750 tons of sludge a day to Kern 
County, where it is called "fertilizer" and spread onto "Green Acres Farm," 
about 5,000 acres owned by the city of Los Angeles.

Like "Greenacres," the 1960s television show featuring inept city slickers 
who move to the countryside and just don't fit in, the city of Los Angeles 
and its stinking, polluting sludge don't fit into Kern County.

And that is why Kern County voters last year overwhelmingly passed Measure 
E, which bans the importation of sludge into Kern County. The ballot measure 
and ban came after Los Angeles repeatedly rebuffed pleas to relocate its 
"farm" away from a critical underground water storage facility and urban 
development.

Kern County voters, sick of gagging on the smells, feared Los Angeles' human 
and industrial waste would contaminate the ground and water supply.

But a federal judge in Los Angeles now has overturned Measure E, contending 
the ban discriminates against Los Angeles and violates constitutional 
commerce protections.

Acknowledging Kern County residents have legitimate environmental concerns, 
the judge ruled that Los Angeles can keep shoving its filth down our 
throats.

Kern County supervisors will meet later this month to discuss their next 
legal move. The voters already have spoken. This is a righteous fight that 
must continue to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

It is a fight that would end if Los Angeles and other big cities worried 
more about really being "green" than just saving a buck by dumping on their 
rural neighbors.

http://www.bakersfield.com/opinion/editorials/story/213959.html