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Tracy Ripon•, 3.f. 1998Nk � e tire fire - ` 132 SAN 33 JOAQUIN Grayson CO. ' STANISLAUS CO. Filbin tire- t '' pile fire Sheldon Cordier-Carpenter/Record over the incineration plant from - Oxford in 1993. About a dozen employees remained at the facili- ty Wednesday, doing maintenance while fire crews fought to bring ' the blaze under control. "We are shut down right now, but once the fire subsides, we would like to get back to work;" Tomeo said. "Hopefully, it won't be a year, and I don't believe it will be. Hopefully we'll be back in a week." Some fire crews may be released from the scene as early as tonight, said Gary Hinshaw, a Record photo by MICHAEL McCOLLUM division chief with the Modesto ;loseup look Wednesday at the Westley tire fire in Stanislaus County. City Fire Department. bankruptcy protection and aban- Residents watching "Mr. Filbin doesn't doned the site. Folks living and working in the Since then, the state has immediate area hope the smoke believe the tires are his focused its cleanup efforts on Filbin, but Chandler said Filbin doesn't head their way. responsibility." hasn't been cooperating. "We were in Tracy when that In July 1998, Filbin reportedly fire was going on," said one — Ralph Chandler, ordered a waste-board inspection woman who lives with her family waste-board official team to leave his property. On in a house at the entrance of a Sept. 7, attorney Thomas Trapp of private road leading to the tire partner in the incineration plant, San Francisco stated in an appeal facility. "The fire was never a big for $2.7 million. Filbin leased the of the waste board's cleanup order deal to us then, and we're not property on which the tares were that state regulators had shown worried about (this) fire now;' said piled to the company but retained no evidence of "a substantial the woman, who declined to give ownership of the land. probability of harm" from the tire her name. "But we're watching the In 1997, the waste board pile or that the pile was a public news." ordered Oxford to remove all the nuisance. Dorothy Arnaud, manager of tires by July 1999. To hasten the Trapp said Filbin is not person- Ingram Creek Restaurant off I-5 at cleanup, the state paid Modesto ally responsible for the cleanup, Westley, said the fire hasn't affect- Energy, a subsidiary of UAE, $1.2 since his tire-collection business, ed business at the cafe. But she is million over the next two years to not Filbin as an individual, had keeping an eye on the situation. incinerate about 4 million of the stockpiled the tires. What's more, tires. Trapp said, Filbin can't be forced "We're concerned about the Chandler said Oxford was sup- to remove the tires, because he smoke and will just have to wait posed to burn the rest of the tires doesn't own them, Oxford does. and see," she said. at its own expense but did not lawyers for the waste board say - The Associated Press, the Tracy live up to that agreement. The Filbin is responsible, because he Press and Record Capitol Bureau board revoked Oxford's permit in owns the land. Chief Jim Sams contributed to this August 1998. Oxford filed for Tomeo said UAE Corp. took report.