Posted on: Sunday, March 9, 2003

EDITORIAL
Kill toxic plans for landfills over aquifers

As far as we're concerned, aquifers and landfills go together like fire and gasoline.

And so we're relieved that the state Senate has shelved a bill that would have permitted landfills to be built over drinking water supplies.

Our fears weren't the least bit assuaged by an amendment to the bill's language to say the counties "may" rather than "shall" allow a landfill to be built over an aquifer.

It's plain bad policy to build a landfill where toxins can leach into the water supply.

That's not to say we don't understand the pressure for politicians to find a new landfill site as the Leeward Coast's overwhelmed Waimanalo Gulch runs out of space. Nearly 70 percent of O'ahu's land is over an aquifer.

But why create an environmental hazard when there are viable sites such as the Ameron quarry above Kailua, which is lined with rock?

Right now, Central O'ahu Recycling and Disposal Facility Inc. wants to establish a landfill on 100 acres owned by Campbell Estate in Kunia. The site is over the Pearl Harbor Aquifer, the island's largest water resource.

We urge the Honolulu City Council to take a stand and ban the poisonous merger of landfills and aquifers. Nothing good can come of such a wedding.