Waste Management to pay $2.8M fine for landfill violations
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The Hawai'i state Department of Health has fined the city and Waste Management Hawaii for operational deficiencies at the Waimanalo Gulch Landfill. Trash was being compacted yesterday at the landfill before dirt could be piled on. Dennis Oda / doda@starbulletin.com
Citations justify complaints, say Waianae area politicians
By Diana Leone / Honolulu Star-Bulletin Staff Writer
HONOLULU, Hawai'i - A $2.8 million state fine for permit violations at the city's Waimanalo Gulch Landfill justifies what Waianae Coast residents say they have been complaining about all along, lawmakers contend.
"In my view it legitimizes all the concerns we've been raising over the past year -- both my office and the Council and, most importantly, the community," City Councilman Todd Apo, who represents the Waianae area, said yesterday.
"Now we find that we weren't imagining that smell, as they told us we were," said state Sen. Colleen Hanabusa (D, Waianae). "The odor was because they did not cover sludge as it came in."
Hanabusa also questioned whether a $2.8 million fine would be enough to make the Waianae Coast landfill operator change its ways because of the profit the city makes of $30 million to $50 million a year.
A Department of Health order issued yesterday against the city and its contractor Waste Management Hawaii lists 18 violations of the operating permit for the landfill. . . Read more
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