LAND BOUGHT TO EXPAND DUMP NO DEVELOPMENT PLAN FOR REST OF SITE.

Byline: Andrea Cavanaugh Staff Writer

SIMI VALLEY - Waste Management Inc. plans to expand the Simi Valley Landfill and double its volume following the purchase of a 2,800-acre site north of the city, company officials said Friday.

The land was purchased for an undisclosed price from Unocal, which lost its bid to build a massive residential and commercial development on the site.

Waste Management intends to expand its landfill from 185 to 400 acres and the volume from 3,000 to 6,000 tons of trash per day, said Scott Tignac, the landfill's manager. The rest of the property - the last remaining parcel of undeveloped land in the Simi Valley area - likely will be resold.

``It's not going to be a 2,800-acre landfill,'' Tignac said. ``And we're not developers. We would not be developing it for either residential or commercial use.''

Simi Valley Mayor Bill Davis welcomed word of the sale and plan to expand the local landfill, located north of the Ronald Reagan Freeway between Simi Valley and Moorpark.

``Unocal probably would have sat on this property forever and ever and never come up with something,'' Davis said. ``Waste Management won't develop it, but they'll sell the property off to someone who will.''

Any landfill expansion would require an environmental impact report, compliance with the California Environmental Quality Act and approval from Ventura County supervisors.

The landfill expansion will mean a boon to cash-strapped Ventura County, which gets a $1.95-a-ton tipping fee. About 30 percent of the trash dumped at the Simi Valley Landfill comes from outside Ventura County.

Two Ventura County supervisors said they would have reservations about approving a landfill expansion.

``I would be very concerned about doubling the volume,'' Supervisor John Flynn said. ``We don't want to become the dumping ground of Southern California.''

Supervisor Linda Parks said she would call for a stringent environmental review and increase tipping fees for out-of-county haulers, as other counties have done.

``Otherwise, we're going to reach capacity ourselves and have to ship our waste elsewhere,'' she said.

Tim Hodge, a spokesman for Citizens for a Safe and Scenic Simi Valley, said extending the landfill's lifespan beyond the current estimate of 2025 through expansion would be acceptable, but that doubling its volume isn't.

``If they want to double the tonnage, that's a big concern,'' he said.

The added capacity will be needed as Ventura County's two other landfills close in the next two decades, Tignac said.

Waste Management also expects to relocate a commercial recycling facility from Los Angeles Avenue to the landfill site, and double the volume of its ``green'' recycling program from 500 tons to 1,000 tons of waste per day, Tignac said.

The landfill's expansion would increase truck traffic from about 500 trips per day to 650 per day, Tignac said. Expanding green recycling would add an additional 100 daily truck trips, he said.

Waste Management plans to immediately sell off about 300 acres of commercial property near Los Angeles Avenue in Simi Valley and 250 acres near Moorpark, Tignac said.

The fate of the remaining acreage is unclear. Waste Management has been unable to discuss the property with potential buyers because of a confidentiality agreement with Unocal that expired Thursday, Tignac said.

Unocal decided to sell the property after the Simi Valley City Council last year rejected its plans for 1,370 homes and more than 450 acres of commercial development because the proposal violated the city's hillside building restrictions, said Brian Kelly, vice president of the Unocal Land and Development Co.

The city's Municipal Code restricts commercial development on slopes greater than 10 percent and residential building on slopes greater than 20 percent.

``We've been working on this for five years,'' Kelly said. ``We've spent a lot of time and a lot of money. We had to make a business decision that it was time to move on.''

In addition to homes and office buildings, the Unocal project would have included parks, open space, a cemetery and a permanent site for Simi Valley Days, an annual weeklong community festival. Waste Management hopes to make portions of the property available for those uses, Tignac said.

Andrea Cavanaugh, [phone]

andrea.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

photo, map

Photo:

Waste Management Inc. purchased 2,800 acres north of Simi Valley to expand the Simi Valley Landfill.

Michael Owen Baker/Staff Photographer

Map:

2,800-acre Unocal property

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