Composting facility expansion on Highway 25 should be denied or
sent back for a full environmental review
Z-Best Composting, located south of Gilroy just south of Highway 25, wants Santa Clara County to allow it to use 50 more acres of its site for composting.
The facility currently uses 77 acres to compost manure, tree branches, and farm and yard waste, much to the annoyance of its neighbors’ noses.
“As time has gone on, they’ve covered more and more of the ground to the point we have a major odor issue, a tremendous increase in flies and large trucks traveling down there,” Ralph Santos told reporter Serdar Tumgoren.
Santos, a longtime farmer, lives northeast of the composting facility, which opened in 1998. He says the expansion is outside of the scope of the project’s original environmental review and is asking that new reviews be ordered for this project.
A Z-Best attorney says the expansion won’t mean more traffic: “When you hear the word ‘expansion’ project, people think, ‘Oh my god, it’s going to get bigger, there’s going to be more traffic.’ That’s just not the case,” Peggy O’Laughlin, Z-Best’s lawyer, said.
That might be true, but the problem is that her assertion only addresses one of the three concerns expressed by neighbors.
Clearly, the facility is bothering its neighbors at its current size. Expanding it – already the largest composting facility in the state – is not likely to make that situation any better.
Just because the neighbors are few doesn’t mean their concerns shouldn’t be taken seriously. The proposal clearly warrants environmental studies before a final decision is made.
County planners have recommended project approval, which is expected to be reviewed by the planning commission on Feb. 1.
Faced with expensive and lengthy environmental review or outright denial of their proposal, it’s likely that Z-Best’s owners will consider a wiser course: Finding rural land with few, if any, neighbors. Suitable sites should be plentiful in San Benito County and the price is likely a lot lower – though not as convenient – to boot.
We urge planning commissioners to at least order the environmental studies that Santos and other Z-Best neighbors have reasonably requested, or, given the problems that the facility is currently creating for its neighbors at its present size, reject the expansion proposal outright.
