Panel unable to agree
on landfill sitesA lack of consensus means
the committee will postpone
a report
A citizen panel charged with recommending where to landfill Oahu's trash after 2008 is split over whether to pitch one, four or five sites to the City Council.
So, the Mayor's Advisory Committee on Landfill Siting postponed releasing its report yesterday until its Dec. 1 deadline.
Nine of the 15 members have signed a statement that they believe Waimanalo Gulch, the city's current landfill, must be removed from consideration.
Meeting over the past four months, the committee whittled an original list of eight potential sites to five, including Waimanalo Gulch. The others are in Maili, Nanakuli and Makaiwa Gulch on the Leeward Coast and at the Ameron Quarry in Kailua on the Windward Coast.
Todd Apo, a committee member and Ko Olina Resort vice president, is among those who maintain that when the state Land Use Commission approved the city using Waimanalo Gulch until May 2008 that it was with the promise that the city would relocate its landfill at that time.
"This committee does not have consensus on these five sites," Apo said. He proposed choosing the Nanakuli site but was unable to get enough votes from the 11 members at yesterday's meeting.
Committee members state Rep. Cynthia Thielen (R, Kailua), Kailua Neighborhood Board Chairwoman Kathy Bryant-Hunter and Bruce Anderson, former director of the state Department of Health, emphasized that even if Waimanalo Gulch is removed from consideration, they do not believe the committee has enough information to make a fair decision among the other four other sites.
"If we rush to pick a site, it's going to be done without a lot of information," Bryant-Hunter said.
Though the Land Use Commission asked the city for one site recommendation, it cannot mandate it, Anderson said.
The committee used a point scale to assess the social, environmental and financial pros and cons of eight sites on Oahu that consultants said could hold 10 or more years of Oahu's refuse at current disposal levels.
Members refused yesterday to release their draft report and set another meeting for Dec. 1, despite the fact that Anderson and Thielen said they would not attend.
Facilitator DeeDee Letts said any of the 11 members at yesterday's meeting would be allowed to vote on a final draft via e-mail.
