On the Rocks : Neighbors Want Quarry Closed

As Jim Kirst tells it, he tries to be a good neighbor. Kirst says that in the 28 years he’s operated a rock quarry in the hills above Azusa and Duarte, he made every attempt not to intrude on the lives of nearby residents.

So Kirst says he cannot understand why some of those neighbors want to put him out of business.

The Duarte City Council and residents from both cities have urged Azusa, where the quarry is located, to evict Kirst’s company. The Azusa Planning Commission began public hearings last week on whether to revoke the company’s operating permit.

“That felt like an ambush,” Kirst, who owns both Azusa Rock Co. and its parent company, Kirst Construction Co., said after the meeting. “I don’t understand why those people are saying what they’re saying.

“I’m not a bad guy,” he said. “I never have been and I never will be. . . . I’ve always done whatever was asked” to pacify residents.

History of Complaints

Not so, said Duarte Mayor John Hitt, who charged that Azusa Rock has a history of disregarding numerous complaints about truck noise, dust, safety and environmental concerns.

“They have always said, ‘We’re here; we’re going to mine this rock when we want, where we want, whenever we want and how we want,’ ” Hitt said. He said Duarte has been inundated with complaints about the quarry in neighboring Azusa.

After years of complaints from Duarte residents who live near the quarry, city officials there have spearheaded the drive to persuade Azusa to close the quarry.

Duarte, which has hired consultants to help in the fight, asked the Azusa Planning Commission last week to halt operations at the quarry until it makes a decision on the operating permit. The City Council has the final say on revoking the permit.

Hitt said he was pleased with a decision by the Planning Commission to continue the public hearing until June 8, which will give both sides more time to prepare.

Azusa Rock officials and its foes agree that they face what could be a protracted battle over the quarry’s future. Eventually, they say, the matter may have to be decided in court.

“I think we began to lay the groundwork,” Hitt said after the meeting. “That operation is a danger to public health and safety and it is a public nuisance.”

Duarte officials, responding to complaints from residents, also lobbied Azusa to deny a permit to a businessman who wanted to build another quarry next to Azusa Rock. Azusa businessman James Restivo’s request for a permit to mine 20 acres was denied by the Planning Commission. He has appealed the decision to the City Council.

Duarte officials say they have received hundreds of complaints over the past few years. The Restivo request, they say, added fuel to the fire.

The Planning Commission began its hearings on Azusa Rock after the City Council directed it to consider whether the company’s special-use permit, which has allowed mining of the canyon since 1956, should be revoked.

Closure Urged

A report to the Planning Commission by a member of the Azusa city staff concludes that the quarry should be closed.

“The continuing operation of the subject quarry constitutes a public nuisance due to truck noise, air quality degradation, interference with public access to U.S. Forest Service lands, destruction of sensitive plant and wildlife species, aesthetics and unauthorized expansion of the use,” the report says.

Canyon City Rock Products held the original permit to remove rock, sand and gravel from the 190-acre site. Kirst took over the quarry in 1960.

Rock from the quarry has been used in numerous public works projects. The company provided concrete and rock lining for the San Gabriel River in the 1960s and rock bedding for the Los Angeles Metro Rail, for which it has a two-year, $2.5-million contract, Kirst officials said.

Azusa Rock President Tom Sheedy said that between 4 million and 8 million tons of rock has been removed since the quarry opened and that the permit does not restrict how much they can mine.

Operation Expanded

The quarry originally provided rock only for Kirst Construction projects, Sheedy said. But the operation was expanded in 1983, now accounting for half of Kirst Construction’s $8-million annual sales, he said.

“It would have a substantial effect on the company if we had to close operations,” he said.

Closing the quarry would also have financial consequences for Azusa. The city will receive $300,000 from the quarry this year in excavation taxes, said Geoff Craig, Azusa finance director. A handful of other quarry operations will bring in an additional $120,000 to the city, he said.

The battle over the quarry will likely hinge on interpreting the 1956 use permit.

Roy E. Bruckner, Azusa’s director of community development, who wrote the report to the Planning Commission, said the quarry could be closed if the commission finds that it violated permit conditions or that it represents a public nuisance.

Violations Alleged

In 1980, the city attorney ruled that the permit was still valid, but Azusa could revoke it if Kirst has violated any of the provisions in the 1956 document. According to Bruckner’s report, a number of violations exist.

But Kirst’s attorney, Glenn R. Watson, disputed Bruckner’s conclusion, saying that Azusa Rock is in full compliance and that there are no grounds to revoke the permit.

“They made some gross errors,” Watson said of the city staff, declining to cite specifics. “We will respond later.”

Bruckner’s report said Azusa Rock has failed to live up to a number of conditions in the permit, including fencing the perimeter of the quarry, putting rock-crushing equipment underground to reduce noise and using excess rock to help fill the holes created by mining.

Sheedy said that the fence had fallen down a week before Bruckner’s inspection and that a new one is now in place.

Bruckner’s report says that the quarry violates the condition that “the use will not be a menace to or endanger the public health, safety or general welfare.”

Excess Noise

The report mentioned a city study conducted during two days in January, 1987, when trucks hauling rock along Encanto Parkway, which parallels the border between the cities, exceeded Duarte noise standards 19 times and Azusa standards 12 times.

In an interview, Sheedy said the parkway was built and paid for by Kirst in 1960 in response to complaints by Duarte residents about trucks on Fish Canyon Road. Until then, Fish Canyon was the main truck route to the quarry. Many of the current complaints, he said, come from houses that were built too close to the parkway.

Bruckner’s report also states that in 1986, the South Coast Air Quality Management District cited Kirst Construction three times for emitting heavy concentrations of dust and other pollutants and once for operating a rock crusher without a permit.

District spokesman Art Davidson said Azusa Rock voluntarily complied with the district’s directives and no court actions were needed.

Fish Killed

Bruckner’s report says the quarry has obstructed access to Fish Canyon and Fish Canyon Falls and has had detrimental effects on the area’s wildlife habitat by killing fish and rare plants indigenous to the canyon.

The report also states that the beauty of the San Gabriel Mountains behind the cities is being destroyed, noting that an 800-foot-high scar on the hillside may be permanent.

Finally, Bruckner said the quarry operation has been enlarged beyond permit limits, which called for one rock crusher, one rock sifter and three stockpiles. Azusa Rock has two sifters and six stockpiles, according to the report.

Watson declined to address the staff report point by point but said the company will challenge it during the June public hearing. However, he denied that his firm had expanded beyond the 1956 limits or that it had more equipment than permitted.

Compliance Claimed

Moreover, Watson said that because Kirst is complying with the permit, it could not represent a public nuisance under state law.

In addition to Azusa city staff, Duarte and Azusa residents gave the Planning Commission reasons why the quarry should be closed.

Alma Herzog, 80, of Azusa said her house near the quarry has been ruined by an unrelenting stream of ash.

“My house is an absolute wreck,” she said. “I’ve called painters, and they have refused” to work on the house.

Duarte resident John Jansen blasted the quarry operation for cutting off access to Fish Canyon Falls, a favorite outdoor area for his family. Before the company expanded in the early 1980s, hikers could easily walk the 3 miles to the falls, which is north of the quarry in Angeles National Forest.

“There was a time just a few years ago when we could go on up there and there was nothing going on at the quarry,” he said. “Now we can’t even get (to the falls).”

Letters of Concern

Numerous letters from hospitals and schools were presented to the commission by Duarte environmental consultant Terry Fitzgerald, who read the writers’ concerns over harmful effects from dust from the quarry.

“I believe that rock quarrying activities in our neighborhood could potentially adversely impact the well-being of both healthy residents and pulmonary patients in a variety of ways,” wrote Dr. David A. Horak, City of Hope National Medical Center director of respiratory diseases.

James R. McVeigh, regional director of the American Water Works Service Co., told the commission that improper storage of gasoline and diesel fuel at the quarry threatens to contaminate a drinking-water source less than 1,500 feet away. McVeigh submitted pictures of alleged spills at Azusa Rock resulting from fuel stored above ground in 50-gallon drums.

The upper San Gabriel Aquifer, from which the company supplies water to Duarte, Bradbury and parts of Monrovia, is one of the few in the San Gabriel Valley to escape contamination because of its elevation, he said.

“If this is allowed to continue, there is no question (the fuel) will find its way into our wells,” McVeigh said.

Watson said that fuel has not been stored improperly and that McVeigh’s claims of water purity proved it.

“In 32 years, there is no trace of contamination from this property,” Watson said.

Legal Grounds

The Azusa City Council has not taken a stand on closing the quarry. The council referred the matter to the Planning Commission after a March meeting when Azusa resident Cristina Cruz-Madrid told the council they had legal grounds to revoke the permit. Cruz-Madrid, an attorney, said she was speaking for a number of residents.

Her position was supported by Councilman Bruce Latta and Lucio Cruz, her father and a former councilman. Both had promised to close the quarry while campaigning for the April 12 municipal election. Cruz was ousted from the council. Latta lost the race for mayor but retains his council seat. His term expires in two years.

Newly elected Councilmen Harry Stemrich and Tony Naranjo declined to comment on Azusa Rock’s future, citing legal advice.

“This is not the time to be detoured by threats of lawsuits, whether real or imagined,” Duarte Mayor Hitt told the Planning Commission.

Offer of Aid

Hitt, in an interview after the meeting, said his city would extend financial and legal help to Azusa if lawsuits were to result. Duarte has set aside $75,000 for protecting the environment and will appropriate more if necessary to close the quarry, he said.

“The next question is if the will is there,” he said. “And based on what I’ve heard from an awful lot of Azusa citizens, I think it is.”

Watson, the attorney for Kirst, said Azusa officials should be cautious.

“They better be a little bit careful or they may find themselves paying a bundle,” he said.

When asked if he would sue Azusa if the permit is revoked, Kirst said: “I sure as hell will.”