I spent about a half-hour near the top of Grimes Canyon Monday. While, like everyone who drives that crooked two-way road, I have been aware of the sand quarry for decades.

Until you park your vehicle, stand on top of the berm, and look down towards the heart of the quarry you won't understand the magnitude of the operation. It's huge.

The City of Malibu is seeking to reestablish its devastated beach area with sand from the Grimes Canyon quarry. Storms have washed away the beach and dunes which were once a favorite place for public recreation. Malibu has established a $31 million fund to push an estimated 43,000 truck trips, during the first stage of the project, or 420 trips per day. This train of double-belly-dump trucks would travel down highway 23 from the Grimes Canyon quarry, through Fillmore on Highway 126 and Santa Paula, Ventura, Oxnard, on down to Highway 101 and Malibu. All this to assure some Malibuian gets her suntan.

Having spent the first 19-years of my life on a local ranch, and three years on the Alaskan pipeline, I know and love heavy equipment. It's not the quarry or its operation that bothers me. In fact I'm happy to note what appears to be a phenomenally successful business.

But there can be too much of a good thing, and this plan is that. The scope of this idea is just overwhelming. The city of Moorpark and the organization that has contracted with it (Broad Beach Geologic Hazard Abatement District) without consulting with the City of Fillmore, agreed to save Moorpark from the proposed massive traffic and dump it all on Fillmore. Talk about sneaky neighbors!

Common sense alone should alert the powers that be to the absurdity of this plan. I have not seen the contract, but reliable reports say "The 10-year plan, approved by the California Coastal Commission earlier this month, will allow residents to import 300,000 cubic yards of sand every five years to rebuild sand dunes lost over the years due to pounding storms and high tides." We are supposed to believe that a sneaky contract backed by $31 million will avoid future "pounding storms and high tides"?

Fillmore has for years sought to limit truck traffic from the quarry to a reasonable number. This new proposed agreement would make any such future negotiations impossible. Adding these hundreds of new daily truckloads would make life miserable for the residents of Fillmore.

As someone who has traveled the Grimes Canyon road since the days of the green bridges, I can certify that car traffic would be snarled endlessly. Rush hours would be made miserably slow. Impatient drivers seeking to pass slower trucks would cause more accidents. Noise and dust in town would increase exponentially.

Where is that Environmental Protection Agency when we need it? It's always there when we don't. If there were ever a time for the citizens of Fillmore to raise their voices, and call their Representatives, it is now. Fillmore only learned of the Moorpark contract with Malibu at the last minute. That contract and the approval of the California Coastal Commission, are being appealed by the County of Ventura and the City of Fillmore. Should we lose the appeal, the issue should go to the Circuit court.

420 MORE trips per day! That's just nuts.