EPA BILLS SCHOOL DISTRICT FOR DUMP CLEANUP; LAUSD HAD SENT TOXIC WASTE TO REMOTE SITE.

Byline: David R. Baker Daily News Staff Writer

Years ago, the Los Angeles Unified School District dumped its hazardous waste at a disposal facility tucked in the countryside of Santa Barbara County.

Now, a cleanup bill is coming due.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has told the district to pay $90,315 to help clean the site or face the prospect of paying more in the future, an EPA spokesman said Tuesday. The district is one of 820 former dump users that recently received letters from the agency, which is overseeing the $400 million cleanup.

Under federal law, trash producers who send waste to a site can be held liable for cleanup costs. The cost of cleaning the Casmalia Disposal Site far exceeded expectations.

Board of Education members discussed the notice at a closed-door meeting Tuesday, and reached no decision on whether to pay. But they aren't pleased with the prospect.

In using a designated hazardous waste landfill, they said, the district did nothing wrong.

``It's very frustrating to me that a public agency that followed the rules and disposed in a designated site should have to pay,'' board member Julie Korenstein said after the meeting.

The Casmalia site was one of just a few permitted hazardous waste landfills in California during the 1970s and 1980s, said EPA public information officer David Schmidt.

``A major portion of the state's hazardous waste went into that site,'' he said.

Located in northwestern Santa Barbara County and named after a nearby town so small it doesn't appear on many maps, the now-closed landfill has proved difficult to clean. Until now, cost overruns have been borne in part by the 52 companies and agencies that dumped the most waste there. But with the price continuing to climb, the EPA has now asked other former users to pay.

Based on the quantity of trash each user dumped, the amount the EPA has requested ranges from $60,000 to $600,000, Schmidt said.

By that standard, the school district, which sent 518,612 pounds of hazardous waste to the site, faces a relatively light fee. For comparison, the district is currently contemplating spending more than $700,000 to identify toxins on the site of the future Belmont Learning Complex downtown.

But Korenstein said the money could still be better spent elsewhere.

``When I'd rather spend $90,000 on books, it's very frustrating,'' she said.

Neither Schmidt nor district officials reached Tuesday knew precisely what kinds of materials the district had dumped in the landfill.

LAUSD officials now have 60 days to respond to the letter. Rather than pay, they could challenge the amount requested by asking federal officials to review how much trash they sent to the landfill, Schmidt said. Or they could plead that paying the amount would cause a financial hardship.