Wed, Jan 23, 2008 (2 a.m.)

An argument by the local garbage company that ratepayers are on the hook for cleanup costs resulting from a 1998 rainstorm has been rejected by the Clark County district attorney’s office.

Legal opinions signed by Deputy District Attorney Elizabeth Vibert should now spur the company into signing papers obligating it to finish the cleanup at its own expense and according to specifications set by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Republic Services has long enjoyed an exclusive contract a monopoly with Clark County. Until 1993, when a new landfill opened, the company used the landfill at Sunrise Mountain, which is now closed.

The seal on that landfill, which is federally owned but leased by the county, broke during the rainstorm. Garbage washed into Lake Mead source of Las Vegas’ drinking water.

The Environmental Protection Agency ordered Clark County and Republic Services to reseal the landfill, a job then estimated to last a year and cost $36 million. The county then cut a sweetheart deal with the garbage company. Republic Services readily agreed to fund the cleanup in exchange for a 15-year contract extension, to 2035.

Because the estimated cleanup cost represented a tiny fraction of the worth of the extension, Republic Services was seen as getting the much better end of the deal.

But complications arose when the EPA rejected Republic Services’ cleanup plan. The dispute continues today, and now Republic Services faces costs possibly twice the original estimate.

A clause in the company’s agreement with Clark County allows it to ask for a rate increase if the cleanup exceeds $36 million. The company now argues there’s enough ambiguity in the clause that the county should allow it to impose a 2.2 percent surcharge on ratepayers.

Vibert wrote that the contract is “in no way ambiguous.” In our view, Clark County has more than lived up to its end of the bargain. Now it is time for Republic Services to honor its end.