From: eric@milton.u.washington.edu (Eric Hirst)
Newsgroups: rec.climbing,rec.backcountry
Subject: Re: Big new landfill next to J-Tree?
Date: 7 Jan 93 02:11:28 GMT
Organization: University of Washington
NNTP-Posting-Host: milton.u.washington.edu

OK, here's the article I mentioned in a previous rec.climbing post (I'm
putting on rec.backcountry now as well).  It appears to be from a Sierra
Club or Wilderness Society type publication, dated November/December, but
again I don't know the exact source and would appreciate if somebody could
fill that in.  I would also appreciate comments from others more familiar
with the project.

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GIANT LANDFILL PLANNED NEAR JOSHUA TREE

The Bureau of Land Management and Riverside County, California, may permit
construction of what would be the world's largest regional solid waste
dump, 8,000 feet from the border of Joshua Tree National Monument.

The Eagle Mountain Landfill, planned as a final resting place for garbage
from Southern California, would occupy 4,000 acres a mile and a half south
of the park.  BLM issued a final environmental impact statement on the project
this summer and may approve it soon.

The effect on Joshua Tree would be "immense, unimaginable," said Russ Butcher,
NPCA Pacific Southwest regional director.  "This is one of the gravest threats
to any of the Southwest's national parks to come along in decades."

Mine Reclamation Corporation, the company proposing the project, would create
the landfill at the site of an abandoned mine. Cities and counties in southern
California would send the landfill 20,000 tons of trash by train and truck
each day.  Over its projected 115-year life, the total would come to more
than eight million tons.

Less than 200 miles from Los Angeles, Joshua Tree encompasses half a million
acres of desert, marked by mountains, palm oases, large expanses of desert
wildflowers, and the Joshua trees for which the park is named.

"We keep calling it a giant experiment," said Bob Moon, Joshua Tree's
chief of resources management.  According to Moon, there is little scientific
information on the effects of landfills in places as pristine as the Joshua
Tree area.  "We don't think they can prove beyond a shadow of doubt that it
wouldn't have a significant impact on the monument," he said.

The BLM report concluded the project would not lower visibility in the park.
Its analysis was deficient, however, according to California's South Coast
Air Quality Management District.  BLM did not use the appropriate Environmental
Protection Agency-approved model in its calculations.  After conducting its
own analysis, the Park Service found the project will result in visibility
impairment within Joshua Tree.

Noise from the project will be audible in wilderness areas of the park.
The landfill will be visible from the park, especially as it grows into
an artificial mountain in the project's later years.

The threatened desert tortoise in in precarious shape elsewhere in the
California desert, but healthy populations exist in and around the monument.
The landfill, however, is expected to attract large numbers of scavenging
ravens.  An increase in ravens, which prey on the tortoises, could send
these populations into sharp decline.

For many foreseeable problems, plans for the project do not include
preventative or mitigative steps, only monitoring.  One exception is the
company's plan to keep trash from blowing off the landfill site, but it
is still likely that strong desert winds will carry some garbage into the
park.

Mine Reclamation Corporation must receive approval for the project from
Riverside County as well as from BLM.  The county, which stretches from
cities near Los Angeles to the Arizona border, is divided over the landfill.
Desert towns generally oppose it.  Most of the county's population is in
the western portion, however.  The county is to recieve one dollar for
every ton of trash dumped -- a projected $20,000 a day -- and may find the
deal too tempting to turn down.

"The whole project constitutes an enormous unknown," said Butcher.  "What's
at risk is one of the most pristine and remarkable desert areas left."

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The article urges readers to write letters of protest to:

Russell Kaldenberg
Bureau of Land Management
Box 2000
North Palm Springs, CA 92258

The address at J-Tree is

Bob Moon
Chief of Resource Management
Joshua Tree National Monument
74485 National Monument Drive
Twentynine Palms, CA 92277
(619)-367-7511

You may also attempt to contact Riverside County, but I don't have an address.
****************************************************************************

Eric Hirst
eric@u.washington.edu