More dump sites likely in county, officials say

For decades in rural America, if you had garbage, you probably burned it or buried it.

"Quite commonly, people believe if we just put things in the ground they just go away," says Ron Hicks, a Yakima environmental consultant hired by the owners of a Grandview area farm where a variety of buried garbage, including old pesticides containers, was discovered in March.

Experts say it's hard to know how many other similar dumps exist. But likely there are more than a few.

Many farms go back generations to a time when landfills and garbage service weren't that accessible.

"Not too many years ago ... you could put almost anything on your own land as long as it didn't cause a problem for your neighbor," says Mike Gillett, an environmental attorney in Seattle.

Gillett is representing George and Edith Higgins, two of the property owners involved with the Grandview case. It sounded alarm bells because some soil and water samples showed elevated levels of pesticide in isolated areas.

Authorities are testing some neighboring wells as a precaution, but do not believe the contaminants spread to nearby farms.

It is illegal to bury pesticide. That almost always goes for pesticide containers, too, depending on the label instructions.

But it hasn't always been that way. All sorts of debris was buried on many farms.

Some still is.

Single-family farms and residences can dispose of their own non-hazardous waste on their own land as long as they fence it, or otherwise keep the people and animals out, and cover it monthly with soil.

"It's not something we encourage, that's for sure," says Ted Silvestri, environmental health specialist for the Yakima Health District.

Jerri Honeyford, who grew up on a Sunnyside area farm in the 1940s and 1950s, says burying was a common practice and maybe old habits die hard.

"I think older people still do things the way they used to," says Honeyford, who owns a Concord grape vineyard with her husband, state Rep. Jim Honeyford, R-Sunnyside.

Honeyford, a former president of the Yakima County Farm Bureau, says her family used to bury garbage they didn't burn, feed to the pigs or otherwise use. That didn't leave much. But they stayed clear of wells and water.

"I think there was a lot of common sense," Honeyford says.

In fact, chemical companies used to actually recommend people bury their pesticide drums, says Joye Redfield-Wilder, spokeswoman for the state Department of Ecology.

Today farmers are better trained. They take certification courses on pesticide use and disposal. Pesticide labels include instructions about disposal. And there are free disposal and recycling programs.

The state Department of Agriculture, which regulates the disposal of pesticide containers and waste pesticides, gets few complaints about their improper disposal, says Jason Kelly, a department spokesman from Olympia.

Most violations involve improper application, safety equipment and paperwork. The most recent improper disposal case was in 2005, he says.

"The vast majority of farmers are responsible users of agricultural chemicals," he says.

Farmers are naturally going to be careful with their land. It's more precious to them than anyone, says Dave Cowan, a board member of the Yakima Farm Bureau who farms near the Bethany Road site.

"We don't want to hurt our ground, it's our living," he says. "It's our bank account."

Cowan is a neighbor of Jim and Linda Hansen, the owners of Bethany Hills Farms.

Some of the rules are confusing, contends Hicks, and don't take into consideration the perspective of the people forced to comply with them, the farmers.

For example, the Yakima County landfill accepts herbicide containers as household hazardous waste but no agriculture waste.

He also believes most farmers follow the spirit of the law, keeping harmful chemicals out of the ground.

He contends burying empty, properly rinsed containers won't cause a problem.

He doesn't believe burying garbage causes any more harm than what can happen above ground.

"There's not mystical forces underground," he says.

* Ross Courtney can be reached at 509-930-8798 or rcourtney@yakimaherald.com.

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