Agency’s Plan to Import Trash From San Diego, L.A. Counties Is Scrapped

SANTA ANA — County officials have dropped the controversial idea of importing trash from San Diego and Los Angeles counties after finding little potential for profit and even less interest from outside waste haulers.

Of the more than 100 notices sent to outside agencies by the county, officials said they had received only one proposal from a San Diego County group by Monday afternoon’s deadline.

Murry L. Cable, the county’s Integrated Waste Management director, said Tuesday that the proposal submitted by the North County Solid Waste Management Agency would not come close to reaping the $520 million that was expected for Orange County over the next five years.

As offered, Cable said, the San Diego County proposal could have generated between $1.3 million and $2.3 million for the county each year.

In April, some members of the sharply divided waste commission and a coalition of local waste haulers contended that importing trash would only reduce the county’s own bank of landfill space.

But Cable said then that the plan would reduce the life span of the county’s landfill space by just two years, from 44 years to 42 years.