BFI FACES $830,000 DUMP FEE CITY SAYS BILLS FOR OVERSIGHT, INSPECTIONS SPAN TWO YEARS.

Byline: KERRY CAVANAUGH Staff Writer

In the latest controversy over Sunshine Canyon Landfill, city leaders say Browning-Ferris Industries owes the city $830,000 for oversight and inspections at the Granada Hills dump.

The bills have piled up over two years while BFI and the Department of Environmental Affairs have tangled over whether the company had to pay the city's solid waste facility fee before it officially opened in July 2005.

``We've had inspectors doing work at the landfill. I want to see them pay the bill,'' said Councilman Greig Smith, a BFI critic whose district includes the dump.

Smith said he wants the city to collect the unpaid fees or subtract the money from the city's trash disposal bill.

But while BFI managers said they're willing to pay the appropriate fees, they said the city is charging the company for two years of inspection and oversight -- at roughly $400,000 a year -- at the landfill when it wasn't even open yet.

``How can we expect to pay these fees without an operating landfill?'' BFI District Manager Greg Loughnane asked. ``We'd like to resolve this and move forward.''

The fee dispute is another twist in the city's relationship with BFI. After several years of debate, the Los Angeles City Council in March renewed a five-year, multimillion-dollar contract with BFI to dispose of almost all of the city's trash at the Granada Hills dump.

But the council also pledged to divert 16 percent of L.A.'s refuse to landfills outside city limits and eventually wean the city off the dump.

The current dispute centers on the City Council's Sunshine Canyon Landfill approval in 1999, a deal under which BFI must pay the city a fee in order to hire the city environmental inspectors needed to oversee the landfill operations.

However, the city's Environmental Affairs Department and BFI have debated the fees since the first bill was issued in May 2003.

BFI managers argue that the city began billing the company for oversight before the landfill was open and operating -- last July.

City officials contend they were allowed to levy the charge as soon as the landfill's solid waste permit was finalized in May 2003, in order to train new staffers to inspect the massive landfill.

In a 2003 letter to BFI, Environmental Affairs Supervisor David Thompson wrote that his department ``is already involved in overseeing the closure and pre-construction issues and must have adequate resources to continue these activities along with having trained staff available to conduct inspections on the day the facility opens.''

BFI reluctantly paid $33,000 for oversight during June 2003, but reserved the right to challenge the city's right to collect the fee before the landfill opened.

In 2005, the Environmental Affairs Department sent BFI a bill for roughly $830,000 for oversight from July 2003 through June 2005.

In a letter to the Environmental Affairs Department, BFI General Manager Frank Kiesler protested, saying the company was ``astonished'' to receive bills for oversight after a year and a half.

``As this facility is not currently active and has not commenced the receipt of waste, we do not believe the open landfill permit fees are applicable,'' Kiesler wrote.

BFI has had several meetings with officials in the City Attorney's Office to figure out who is right, and how much the company might owe.

Assistant City Attorney Chris Westoff told the Board of Public Works on Wednesday that the city would pursue BFI for payment, if the company is found to be in default.

Current fee rules don't allow the city to suspend BFI's permit to operate for nonpayment, according to the Environmental Affairs Department, but officials are proposing to revise the ordinance so they can punish permit holders for withholding fees.

Smith said the city could try to take BFI to court and shut down the landfill for violating its permit, but he believes this issue can be resolved before then.

Community members contacted Wednesday said they didn't know BFI owed the city money.

Robert Norris, chairman of a citizens panel appointed to review the landfill, also said he was not aware of the situation but was inclined to side with the city.

``If (the environmental inspectors have) been up at the site, then BFI should pay for them and the city should pursue the funds,'' he said.

kerry.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com

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