VC Star
By David Goldstein
2/1/25
In the gray landscape of fire debris at the tragic sites where homes burned in the Mountain Fire, a flash of green stands out on a hulk.
The green is spray paint forming the letters “VC.” “Hulk” is the term used for the frames of burned vehicles.
Remedial Transportation Services, or RTS, based in Bakersfield, started work under contract to the county of Ventura in late January, removing debris from homes burned by the fire, which broke out Nov. 6. The company’s workers will look for the green “VC” letters, which designate hulks that have been processed by Ventura County staff.
Processing includes using vehicle identification numbers, license plates or other information to remove the vehicle from Department of Motor Vehicles records. This prevents the VIN from being reused for fraud.
“Also, get a junk receipt from the DMV to stop all fees,” advised Jim Mier, general manager of VenTERRA Environmental, an Oxnard-based contractor doing fire cleanup and demolition on a private basis, separate from the county-sponsored program.
Steel, including hulks, is one of the two material types typically recycled by Mier and other contractors clearing burned properties. Other steel recycled from sites may include structural steel, gutters and downspouts, ridge vents, corner trim, corner posts, garage tools and appliances. However, relatively small pieces of steel, such as chimney flashing, roofing fascia, struts, jams, bracing and screws are often attached to burned material or buried in ash. That waste is “burrito wrapped” in thick plastic to avoid spreading dust and ash and is deposited in a landfill.
Concrete is the other major waste recycled from burn sites. “We remove foundations and 3 to 6 inches of soil to clear a site,” Mier said.
Waste is tested before either landfilling or recycling. Asbestos requires additional handling precautions.
“We are also a certified asbestos abatement contractor,” said Mier, “so we suit up in Tyvek, put on respirators during the entire cleanup and separate asbestos tile or other material from clean concrete so we can still recycle the concrete.”
Not only is concrete far less expensive to recycle than mixed debris is to landfill, but in the case of asbestos, the extra labor to separate contaminated material from uncontaminated concrete is more than compensated by reduced hauling costs. VenTERRA hauls the asbestos-contaminated waste all the way to a site in Arizona.
Recycling does require additional labor. Contractors typically hose down the concrete to avoid dust while sifting it in the bucket of an excavator. They spray water on steel, too, as they scrape off dirt, said county Environmental Health Division Manager Sean Debley, whose agency is coordinating the county-sponsored cleanup.
The cleanup program funded by the county and carried out by RTS is crucial for homeowners who don’t have sufficient insurance to pay for clearing their site prior to applying for a new building permit, as it covers costs over policy coverage. However, the county-funded program is reimbursed by available funds in the homeowner’s insurance, so it doesn’t necessarily save money for homeowners whose policies would cover the cost of demolition.
According to Daniel Shoemaker, owner of Shoemaker Demolition, another contractor doing demolitions separate from the county program, there are some advantages to using private contractors
“With a private contractor, you have more control over the pace and scope of a project,” he said. For example, Shoemaker said he can remove additional material on-site, such as septic systems and pools.
Mier pointed out another benefit of private contractors. If compliant with regulations, he can sometimes follow an owner’s direction to remove less than a full-site contract with the county would require.
“If it is not in the debris fallout area, I can often save a patio or a driveway, he said. “Saving at least part of the driveway is useful to make it easier to do the construction that follows cleanup.”
If you are hiring a private demolition contractor, either for fire cleanup or on a regular basis, you can save money and resources by checking to see what structures can be saved and what recycling is possible.
Although Ventura County doesn’t require recycling at total burn sites from the Mountain Fire, partial burns are treated the same as regular demolition projects. For those, the Integrated Waste Management Division, where I work, requires a recycling plan prior to demolition and, after completion, checks receipts to ensure proper disposal and recycling.
More information is available through the debris removal link at venturacountyrecovers.org.
David Goldstein, an environmental resource analyst with the Ventura County Public Works Agency, can be reached at 805-658-4312 or david.goldstein@ventura.org.
