Letter: West Side shouldn’t keep hosting landfill

The Hawaii Land Use Commission has ordered the Waimanalo Gulch Sanitary Landfill in Nanakuli to be closed by 2028, and for the city to identify a new landfill site by Dec. 31, 2022.

A Star-Advertiser article (“BWS chief blocks mayor’s landfill request over aquifer concerns,” Nov. 25) reported that all six possible sites considered by the Landfill Advisory Committee were rejected for either being located in the Honolulu Board of Water Supply’s “No Pass Zone” and/or above an aquifer. This again leaves Nanakuli the most probable next site.

We strongly feel that the city should carefully reconsider other sites, such as the Ameron Hawaii Quarry on the Windward side. In April 2012, the Landfill Advisory Committee’s consultant ranked the quarry as the most favorable location for the next landfill; it is outside the “No Pass Zone” and not located above an aquifer.

Oahu’s West Side has done far more than its fair share. We are the home of landfills, refineries, the HPOWER plant, burgeoning homeless and more. Enough is enough. No more landfills on the West Side!

Sen. Maile Shimabukuro

State Senate District 22

Rep. Darius Kila

State House District 44

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