Garbage problem can’t be dumped in neighbor’s yard

Pity the poor staffer in the mayor’s office who had the miserable task of telling the boss that a consultant’s “data error” had messed up the ranking of possible landfill sites.

The mistake will only further inflame disagreements that develop whenever landfills are brought up because no one wants garbage dumps anywhere nearby, though the detritus of modern life is everyone’s problem.

Oahu has a checkered record when it comes to dealing with trash.

In the latest episode, just days after an announcement that a Kailua quarry was at the top of the list of possible sites, the president of consultant SMS Research revealed that he made a boo-boo when he entered data in “real time” during a meeting of a committee in charge of site recommendations and that the Ameron Quarry had dropped from No. 1 to fifth place in the rankings.

By then, Kailua had begun girding for battle, but stood down upon learning that first and second place had gone to Kahuku, where installing a landfill might be more complicated because the land is held by the federal government and used as Army training grounds.

There are other snags, including long hauls from H-POWER facilities and the island’s population centers that will grow if proposed housing developments get the green light, and the two-lane roads that trace along the shoreline to Kahuku and the two other top spots in Pupukea.

But there’s no sense in printing protest posters yet. The committee simply makes recommendations, so the saga of site selection is expected to go on for a while, with the mayor and the City Council having the unenviable job of choosing.

Still, the city’s Waimanalo Gulch landfill is supposed to be closed in July, the latest deadline in a string of cutoff dates come and gone as officials have struggled to find a new one for more than a decade and as Leeward coast hotels, businesses and residents have demanded it be capped.

Whether Waimanalo Gulch has reached capacity continues to be part of the debate Oahu has had about its persistent trash problem.

The city tried to reduce its load, at one time contracting a company to ship waste to the mainland. That chapter was another of failure.

For months, 20,000 tons of shrink-wrapped stinky garbage piled up in Campbell Industrial Park, awaiting federal approval for a voyage to a Washington state landfill.

Fines for illegal storage of waste from the state Health Department followed.

The Yakama Nation sued the federal government for giving its approval for the shipments without considering its obligations to tribal agreements. A federal judge issued a restraining order to stop the shipments.

In the end, the city abandoned the plan, and paid the contractor to shred the bales of trash, which were then trucked to H-POWER and burned.

Where Oahu goes from here on a landfill is something officials and residents need to look at beyond just choosing a site. Managing waste should be approached from other angles, such as setting limits, expanding recycling or fees for excessive generators. Maybe regional landfills should be set up to make residents more mindful of their waste.

Above all, people should recognize that garbage isn’t another neighborhood’s problem, but a shared responsibility.

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Cynthia Oi can be reached at coi@staradvertiser.com.