Evaluation and Reporting on Contaminant Hydrogeological

12-12-01

Conditions at the Tajiguas Landfill

Page 10 of 24

Community where bacteria has been identified must be evaluated. It is curious that

the November 2001, Bacteria Source Study, by URS Consultants, only reports water

sampling for bacteria in Arroyo Quemado Creek watershed, which is the water shed

east of Canada de la Pila watershed. This assumes that the bacteria is coming from

Arroyo Quemado Creek and totally ignores the fact that the bacteria can be coming

from the landfill directly. It appears, however, that the landfill’s operators do not

intend to address this issue as is demonstrated by the text in the draft EIR on page

3.3-40 which discusses the high bacteria counts in Ocean water at Arroyo Quemado

Beach yet does not even consider addressing the question as to whether or not

there is a relationship between water in the landfill waste and the contamination at

the beach. Furthermore, the terms “landfill operations” and “landfill activities,” which

are used to imply these as potential sources of bacteriological contamination at the

beach, seem to exclude the concept that the landfill waste mass may be a source of

bacteriological contamination via subsurface flows. See excerpt below:

As discussed previously, widespread concern has arisen in Santa Barbara

County over the presence of high bacteria counts in ocean water which has

prompted beach closures and advisories at many County beaches. Of

particular concern in the project area is Arroyo Quemado Beach. The beach

area fronting the mouth of the creek has been subject to advisory or closure

on many occasions since testing began in 1997. Residents in the Arroyo

Quemada community and others have suggested that the landfill may be

responsible for these conditions. The current evaluation of indicator bacteria

focuses on conditions in Pila Creek, the ocean fronting Pila Creek, and a

possible relationship between landfill activities and high indicator levels at

Arroyo Quemado. Specifically, the data evaluation was designed to address

three general questions of interest:

1. Do landfill operations contribute to high indicator levels in Pila Creek?

2. Do high indicator levels at the mouth of Pila Creek contribute to high

long-shore indicator levels near the mouth of Arroyo Quemado Creek?

3. Are there notable elevations in indicator levels elsewhere in the Arroyo

Quemado watershed that could potentially contribute to high ocean levels

near the mouth of Arroyo Quemado Creek?

URS (2001) contains considerable detail regarding the levels of bacteria in

Pila Creek, the ocean, and the Arroyo Quemado watershed. Based on the

available sampling data for the Canada de la Pila watershed downstream of

landfill operations, it appears that bacteriological contamination of surface

water at the mouth of Pila Creek is related to high bacteriological indicator