Monday, April 13, 1998 | 9:51 a.m.
BOULDER CITY -- City leaders who finally resolved a heavily disputed proposal to move the community's landfill to the Eldorado Valley have one more question to ponder.
Do they even want a landfill?
The City Council held a special early morning meeting Friday to weigh the advantages of keeping its 10-acre landfill or replacing it with a transfer station where trash would be hauled out of town.
Lengthy discussions ranging from the landfill's projected lifespan to the difference in cost for customers failed to help the council reach a decision.
"I think the consensus of the community is they want to keep their own landfill, they don't want to truck their refuse outside of the city," Mayor Robert Ferraro told the 15 people who rose early to talk trash.
The mayor's blanket assumption didn't convince all council members that holding onto the landfill is in the best interest of the community.
"I think there are real issues; hard, tough issues you can't sweep under the rug just because people say they want their own landfill," Councilman Bryan Nix said.
"People here have a sense of independence. We have to be independent from the world and I appreciate that, but not if it's a bad decision in the long range."
The council decided in March to keep the landfill at its Utah Street site after residents strongly objected to a proposal to tuck it behind a bluff in the Eldorado Valley.
Residents who live near the landfill complained about the smell and the heavy trucks lumbering through their neighborhoods early in the morning.
The new dump would have made up less than 1 percent of the 107,500-acre valley, but Boulder City citizens felt the facility would damage the environment and threaten desert tortoise habitat.
Since Boulder City Disposal Inc.'s contract expired in February, six companies have been battling to take over landfill duties. Four firms want to operate the dump; two want to close it, build a transfer station and haul trash to the Apex landfill.
Three members of the council met with city administrators on Good Friday to mull over each proposal and study the impact they would have on residents.
Residential fees ranged from $8.50 a month to $12.25 a month with the companies that want to keep the landfill. But council members suggested the city further study whether there are any hidden costs for large pieces of garbage or more than one can.
Companies who applied to operate the landfill are Boulder City Disposal, Nevada Waste Systems Joint Venture James A. Wyse Inc., Thomas Refuse Service Inc./Sierra Waste Transfer Inc., Tony Korfman and RG Waste Systems.
Republic Silver State Disposal Inc. officials said residents would be charged $9.70 a month if it shut down the landfill and hauled garbage to its Apex landfill. RG Waste Services didn't list a figure.
While Silver State's set-up may be most cost-effective, some residents have expressed concern that if Silver State is awarded the contract, it would have a monopoly on waste services in the valley. Silver State already handles refuse for Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Henderson.
Vic Skarr, an environmental health supervisor with the Clark County Health District, said closing the landfill may not be necessary. He confirmed estimates that it will last another 15 years before it must be capped.
"For four years I have watched it grow," Skarr told council members. "Fifteen years is very realistic. These are intelligent and conservative numbers."
Skarr said whether the landfill stays or is replaced with a transfer station, it's important that the company who is awarded the contract is financially stable.
"A landfill can't be operated on a shoe-string budget," he said. "Regardless of who's operating the landfill, there must be enough money to do it properly."
The City Council is expected to decide the fate of its dump and who it wants to operate it at the council's regular April 14 meeting. In the meantime, council members said, they will try to gather input from the community.
"A prudent council member would take the only company that has ever succeeded in the history of the city and give them another try," Councilman Robert Kenneston said, referring to Boulder City Disposal.
Dumping scraps off at the landfill Friday morning, Boulder City resident Al Hutt said there are advantages and disadvantages to keeping the dump open just south of downtown.
He said it is in a convenient location, but he would prefer if the garbage trucks had an alternate route other than through neighborhood streets.
"I think they are running out of space; there's only so much you can put in here," Hutt, who frequents the dump at least once a week, said. "It all depends on where the transfer station is. If it's somewhere else, it will cut down on traffic."
Where the transfer facility would be located was not disclosed. Representatives of the companies vying for the contract said it was too premature to discuss their proposals.
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