EDITORIAL TRASHY LEGACY MAYOR HAHN HAS DONE NOTHING TO SOLVE CITY'S GROWING GARBAGE PROBLEM.

JUST what is Mayor James Hahn going to do with Los Angeles' garbage?

Despite talking trash for years, the mayor has never seemed to make it clear what he or other city leaders plan to do to manage the city's waste in the future.

This is what we know: Hahn and his council supporters are against dumping in Sunshine Canyon Landfill on the edge of Granada Hills, at least once the current contract expires in 2006. But he's done nothing to stop the expansion, so trash from other cities and regions can and will continue to flow into the urban dump.

Meanwhile, the city is receiving bids to send its trash far away from here - at a higher costs, of course. You can't expect to truck 4,700 tons of trash across the desert as far as Arizona every day without incurring extra costs.

This is what passes for a waste management policy in Los Angeles, a city that talks a big game about being pro-environment but that continues to make decisions that contribute to astonishing waste and pollution. With the bill going to the taxpayers, no less.

If Hahn really was concerned about the effects of continued dumping on the area surrounding Sunshine Canyon, surely he and the City Council could have made good on its occasional promises to stop dump operators Browning Ferris Industries from expanding. But they rolled over for BFI, betraying Angelenos and leaving themselves in a pickle.

Now the plan is to spend extra money to haul the city's trash hundreds of miles in air-polluting trucks that add congestion to the roads when the dump is going to continue to take in trash from other sources.

Besides being a monumental waste of resources, it just doesn't make any sense.

There are ways to deal with the city's mounting garbage problem. If Hahn wanted to set an example of reducing the impact to the environment - and not just on the Westside or in the multimillion-dollar estates in the Santa Monica Mountains - he would come up with a plan for reducing and diverting trash before it gets dumped.

Despite promises, the city has yet to start a recycling program in rental apartments and at commercial properties. Never have officials seriously considered alternatives to dumping trash.

It's time for leadership. As Los Angeles continues to grow in population and trash, it will require a comprehensive and sensible plan. Since elected officials refuse to engage the topic in a creative way, we call on the candidates for mayor to make this an major issue in the upcoming election.

By his reluctance to commit to a serious and comprehensive garbage plan, Hahn could be setting himself up for a truly trashy L.A. legacy.