Adams County Gives Final Approval To Landfill

After eight years of controversy, Adams County officials have given their final OK for a regional landfill east of Washtucna, Wash.

The Adams County Health District recently signed an operating permit for the 550-acre private landfill. It will be built by Waste Management Inc. of Washington, a subsidiary of the nation’s largest trash company.

Before construction can start, the project will get further scrutiny from the Washington Department of Ecology to ensure it won’t pollute ground water.

Adams County garbage ratepayers will be able to dump their trash for free when the landfill opens, possibly by January 1999, said Adams County Commissioner Bill Wills.

“It will be a good savings for the average person and the cities of Adams County,” Wills said.

Under its contract with Waste Management, the county is guaranteed a minimum $300,000 a year in revenues, Wills said.

The landfill will be constructed with a double liner and a drainage system to collect liquids. It also will have a secondary collection system directly below the primary drainage system, company officials said.

The landfill “will be the safest and most economical choice for many municipalities throughout the Pacific Northwest,” said Waste Management spokesman Scott Cave.

The project has survived several lawsuits and a contentious battle over its environmental safety.

A grass-roots environmental group, the Organization to Preserve Agricultural Lands, was formed to fight the dump. Its members include wheat farmers who fear it will harm ground water. But OPAL lost its legal battles to derail the project.

The landfill is now smaller than originally proposed.

Seattle was supposed to be its major urban customer when the project was first announced. Adams County politicians hailed the West Side garbage deal as a way to raise big money for their rural coffers.

But Waste Management couldn’t deliver on its promise to have an operating permit for the Washtucna site by January 1995.

That was the date the company was supposed to provide Seattle with the cheaper option of shipping its garbage to Eastern Washington, said Ed Steyh, contract manager for the Seattle Solid Waste Utility.

Seattle penalized Waste Management by negotiating a price lower than the Eastern Washington disposal rate even though its trash continues to go to an eastern Oregon landfill also owned by Waste Management, Steyh said. That contract extends to the year 2028.

Under the contract, Waste Management is still able to dispose of Seattle’s trash at the Washtucna dump, “but we understand that they aren’t planning to,” Steyh said.

That probably won’t change, Wills said.

“I doubt if Seattle’s garage will come. It may after 20 years. And the landfill won’t be on such a big scale now,” Wills said.

Brett Blankenship, a wheat farmer who founded OPAL, says he doubts the project will proceed because another regional landfill isn’t needed.

“They are years behind schedule and millions of dollars over budget. I think the odds are better than even that it will never be built,” he said.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Map of area