The Environmental Protection Agency has barred the shipment of waste to a soil-recycling plant on the Cabazon Reservation in southern California.

The EPA said Western Environmental Inc.., a non-Indian company that leases land from the tribe, can't accept soils or biosolids without EPA approval. The waste has been linked -- although apparently not conclusively -- to odors that have sickened residents of an off-reservation community.

"This effectively shuts them down," Amy Miller, the hazardous waste enforcement manager for the EPA's Southern Pacific region, told The Riverside Press-Enterprise.

The tribe has come under fire for leasing land for the 10-acre facility.

Get the Story:
Press Release: U.S. EPA orders Western Environmental to stop noxious odors coming from its Mecca, Calif. facility (EPA 5/9)
Feds crack down on Mecca stink (The Palm Springs Desert Sun 5/10)
EPA halts hazardous waste shipments to Mecca plant (The Riverside Press-Enterprise 5/10)

Related Stories:
Residents demand closure of plant at Cabazon Reservation (4/29)
Odor at reycling plant on Cabazon Reservation stirs neighbors (3/28)