When the school was built in 1989-90, everyone thought the landfill would be closing soon. Anton Bowers has experience with working with lime and landfills, and he said lime can be a very dangerous chemical to handle. He commented that the landfills in King County have had various problems, including methane gas production, odor, rats, leachate, and salmon die-off. Buggins was asked by the Assembly to comment further. He said Kimsham's leachate is ten to a hundred times more dilute than most textbooks show as the normal for landfill run-off.
More water is pumped from the landfill than can be attributed to rainfall.
The old landfill section under the ballfields is not lined. Various Assembly members clarified that they are giving staff clear direction that staff is to keep looking for alternatives to this type of biosolid solution. Lengthy discussion was held among the Assembly members, including comments that the roadless initiative was the result of a lame duck president, that the community was virtually split on timber issues, that it is vital to take a stand as it limits items like a Southeast Intertie and road access to Sitka from other parts of Baranof Island, that the roadless initiative is an insult to those who labored for 12 years on TLMP as this negates those years of process, that taking no action means the Assembly condones the lack of process, and that it makes no difference if the Assembly takes a stand on the issue. Public testimony was then heard, beginning with Don Muller who expressed dismay that no Assembly member testified at the USFS hearing in Sitka. Brian McNitt, director of the Sitka Conservation Society, thought it appropriate for the Assembly to not take a position because the City was divided on the issue.