March 24, 2016 -- Major contracts to boost monitoring for contamination of Santa Monica’s second-largest drinking water aquifer, to pay for landfills and recycling and to expand the City-run fiber optics network were approved by the City Council Tuesday.

The biggest contract grants as much as $6,352,500 annually over each of the next five years to six firms for a mix of landfill, transformation, composting and recycling of waste generated by residents, businesses and others, according to staff.

Total purchase orders for the half dozen companies selected for the 2016-2017 fiscal year will be less than that, at $4.23 million. But officials expect costs to continue rising in the coming years, with the gate rate for landfills increasing annually from 5 percent to 10 percent and the use of refuse-to-energy facilities adding a 25-percent premium to disposal costs, the report said.

“The cost to redirect [building] construction and demolition waste from the landfills comes at a higher premium with annual increases between 15 to 20 percent,” staff said.

Disposal of other materials also saw cost increases. “The cost for combining the organics waste, green waste, food waste and street sweeping debris, increased the facility rate by 55 percent," staff said.

For the current fiscal year, the City will pay $1.5 million to Chiquita Canyon Landfill; $1.25 million to USA Waste of California, doing business as Agromin Organics; $600,000 to Commerce Refuse-To-Energy; $350,000 to Sunshine Canyon Landfill; $285,000 to Southeast Resource Recovery Facility, and $250,000 to USA Waste of California, doing business as Downtown Diversion.

According to a report issued last year by the by the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle) , "under a business-as-usual scenario, California has sufficient statewide disposal capacity to handle landfilled waste until 2057.

"If California achieves its 75 percent statewide recycling goal, then the current amount of landfill capacity is sufficient to last into the 2080s," according to the report. For the full report visit calrecycle.ca.gov.

In a separate item approved Tuesday, the Council voted to enter into
a modified contract involving the Olympic Groundwater Basin that will provide more wells, pumps and monitoring.

Under the agreement, Virginia-based ICF International will receive an extra $584,736 for work at the aquifer, which officials said provides as much as 1,500 gallons per minute of groundwater for Santa Monica but has a half-century history of industry-related contamination.

Among the new tasks needing “immediate” attention is continued testing of the critical groundwater contaminate 1,4-Dioxane, until 2018 and roughly doubling the samples taken to reach a total of 30, staff said.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' National Toxicology Program has classified Dioxane as "reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen."

Under the approved contract, three new monitoring wells also will be added, as will specialized pumps, the report said. ICF also will redevelop five existing monitoring wells, where the pumps aren’t working properly because they have been clogged by sediment in the wells, the report said.

“Redevelopment of the five wells would involve retaining a drilling contractor with well development equipment and crew, field geologist, traffic control, waste management and disposal, and overall project management,” the report concluded.

Much of the cost of the new work will be reimbursed by Gillette, one of the manufacturers tied to contamination at the site. The City money added to the four-year pact with ICF would bring the total to about $2.8 million.

The Council on Tuesday also approved a contract with VCI Construction, LLC, for excavation, undergrounding, and installation of fiber optic utilities for CityNet’s broadband customers and for work on City facilities

“The recommended contract amount would allow for the City to request the contractor to apply its proposed billing rates to several installations requiring construction on an as-needed basis, and to respond for emergency repair work,” according to the City staff report.

The City began construction of its own fiber network in 2002, providing voice, video, and data communications to City buildings, City officials said. In 2006, the municipal network began leasing dark fiber [extra fiber optic cables that were laid for anticipated future used] to businesses, and four years later launched a lit [ fiber optic cables that are regularly being used] fiber service for businesses under CityNet.

“The City continues to extend the network regularly, for connecting new and existing City facilities, redundant network routes for network reliability, connection of new City assets to the network, including conduit and fiber installation during scheduled street maintenance, and for required maintenance on the existing fiber optic infrastructure," staff wrote in its report.

Santa Monica City builds about 15 fiber routes annually for new CityNet customers, with a construction cost typically ranging from $15,000 to $20,000, officials said.

All CityNet customer installations are contractually obligated to finish utility undergrounding and excavation within 90 days, the industry standard, the report said.