If I ask you to be an advocate for me concerning my relationship with a company, I would expect you to do everything you can to keep me informed of what the company is doing. You may agree with what the company is doing only so long as it is to my benefit. You are MY advocate – not the advocate of the company I asked you to watch for me.

So here is the problem. Members of the Val Verde Committee Advocacy Committee are expected to express to the Chiquita Canyon Landfill company the views of the residents of Val Verde when they meet in that capacity. If and when a member is not accurately expressing Val Verde residents’ views, then it is the obligation of the people of Val Verde to call upon Supervisor Antonovich to replace that person. (He appoints the VVCAC members.) Depending on the nature of the comments – the words the member has used –  that person should be taken to task for conduct in violation of the requirements of the work to be accomplished by the committee.

In my missives about the landfill, a particular committee VVCAC member has seldom made a comment supportive of the residents, and at one point even stated that the Chiquita Canyon Landfill was not in Val Verde.

There was another discussion of the Brown Act – which that particular committee member said did not apply to the committee. Well, the courts have already determined that all elected and appointed commissioners, committee and town council members are subject to the financial disclosure requirements and other aspects of the state’s open-meeting law, i.e., the Brown Act.

If that person could silence the dissent through rudeness, the whole problem of the Chiquita Canyon Landfill would be gone. But as we know, people want to be heard – even when that VVCAC member wants to stop the free speech of Val Verde residents.

There is also the problem that some members of the VVCAC are not residents of Val Verde. I would think it would be difficult to advocate for a community miles from your own.

The Castaic Area Town Council appears to want a cut of the action, too. They want to vote on the landfill expansion – even when the CATC has gotten financial support from the landfill. Not much money is needed for the CATC each year, but don’t you find it odd that the T-shirts made for a CATC fundraiser show the sponsors and, you guessed it: On the back of the T-shirts is an ad, so to speak, for the Chiquita Canyon Landfill. With the landfill and Newhall Land and Farming Co. as sponsors, the needed $8,000 appeared.

I would think the appearance of that money might help the CATC vote for any number of items those two sponsors bring forward, in a most positive manner.

“The taker, after all, serves the giver. Shouldn’t the giver be the public we are chartered to serve, via the county for whom we supposedly exist to advise, and not interest groups standing to lose or gain by our votes?” So asked Richard Hood, a CATC member representing Val Verde, the Aug. 12, 2012, edition of  The Signal.

The county does not pay Castaic Area Town Council at all. The best sponsor gets the votes. Nothing unusual about that in northern LA County. I can see it now. When the landfill expansion is approved: “The Michael D. Antonovich Chiquita Canyon Landfill.” Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

Mr. Antonovich was against the 1997 expansion of the Chiquita Canyon Landfill. It appears he is in favor of it this time. What has changed?

The change is that Mr. Antonovich is about to “term out” and end his long tenure as a county supervisor. I wonder if Newhall Land and Farming and the operator of the landfill have made some offers of a “golden parachute” when he retires? We’ll have to wait and see.

Just so you don’t think I’ve been slacking off on this job, tomorrow’s writings will include a few items about contaminated monitor wells and the economy of electric vs. internal combustion engine-powered fans. I might sneak in a few facts about the ripped liners that “can’t leak” and are “welded” at all the seams. I always thought metal was welded and plastic was glued.

And another huge part of the dump story is coming soon. NASA has some toxic trash.

The more we dig, the more we find. Oh, in answer to another question: Yes, Castaic Creek does flow into the Santa Clara River.

Darryl Manzer grew up in the Pico Canyon oil town of Mentryville in the 1960s and attended Hart High School. After a career in the U.S. Navy he returned to live in the Santa Clarita Valley. He can be reached at dmanzer@scvhistory.com and his commentaries are archived at DManzer.com. Watch his walking tour of Mentryville [here].