Correction: The original story incorrectly described the opinion issued by City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo and the process by which it was invoked. The story below is corrected.
Call it the controversy that just won’t go away.
Two hours after the Los Angeles City Council failed to extend a five-year contract Friday with Browning Ferris Industries to dispose city trash in the Sunshine Canyon Landfill, L.A. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo affirmed in an opinion that the matter must be put back on the Council’s agenda for next week.
Citing the council’s rules, Delgadillo concluded that the council’s failed 7-4 vote in favor of the contract extension had to be retaken because neither side was able to muster an eight-vote majority, the minimum required for any action by the 15-member council. It had been unclear whether the failed vote would have been sufficient to put the matter to rest.
Delgadillo’s opinion is crucial because two councilmembers were absent from Friday’s vote: Eric Garcetti and Wendy Greuel. Although Greuel has publicly declared her opposition to extending the contract, Garcetti has not taken a position on it. If he votes in favor of the five-year extension and all other votes remain unchanged, that would be the eighth vote needed to pass the extension.
The opinion surprised several councilmembers who left council chambers believing the contract extension issue was closed. BFI, which operates the landfill, had said that Friday was the deadline for extending the contract.
The council’s vote fell short when council President Alex Padilla and councilmembers Janice Hahn, Jan Perry and Greig Smith voted against the extension. It also was a blow to new Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who on Thursday came out in favor of the extension.
Villaraigosa issued a statement late Friday requesting the council pass the extension next week. “I urged the City Council to reconsider the impact of increasing the cost of the disposing our waste and raising residents’ trash fees,” stated the release.
Initially, the vote seemed like a victory for San Fernando Valley residents who have strongly opposed the facility, but it would not close the landfill which has other customers, including Los Angeles County. And it would not even necessarily halt city trucks from dumping trash there, since they could do so at higher market rates.
However, should the contract end June 30, 2006. the city would need to find a reliable, less costly alternative for most of the 3,600 tons per day the city deposits there. Padilla had said he would convene an ad-hoc council committee to study alternative trash disposal strategies.
The Sunshine Canyon landfill has generated controversy for decades as nearby residents have objected to trash trucks going by their neighborhoods and the environmental impacts of the landfill. It was a key issue in the debate surrounding San Fernando Valley failed secession attempt three years ago.
