 I think what I'm doing is feeding through your 20 seconds behind me, so I think we're okay. It's Friday, May 15th, 10.02, Senate Natural Resources Energy, we're convening to follow up on our work on solid waste discussions, particularly as they relate to COVID. So we took quite a lot of testimony on yesterday, and we have a couple of people that either dropped off the call, lost connection, whatever, we will hear from two people briefly a little further down in the meeting, but for now, a priority, especially while we have both the commissioner and Mr. Grady with us, is to turn to looking at some language and looking at the legal landscape around being quote-unquote flexible, so there are things like variances, waivers, there's enforcement discretion, and I think the bottom line question is the committee will need to decide what kind of flexibility, if any, we're interested in ensuring exists in the system, and then secondly, how would it be accommodated? Is current law already provide for that, or would we need something new? That's just teeing up, I think, what we're trying to sort through this morning. So with that, Mr. Grady, if you could walk us through what you've pulled together for us, and thank you for doing that. Sure. I'm going to share my screen, and it'll take me one second. And committee members, just for future reference, whatever, that Mr. Grady's handout also is posted and was emailed to you as a PDF, in case you're wanting to print it, keep it, mark it up, etc. Great. Okay, it is. Does everyone see it? Looks good. Okay, so the chair asked me to summarize some of the authority that the agency of natural resources has under statute to address potential requests or applications to waive or basically not enforce some of the universal recycling requirements that have been discussed by your committee and interested parties over the past couple of weeks. The agency does have in statute a variance authority, 10 BSA 6613. There's a general authority in subsection A when a person who owns or is in control of any plant building structure, process or equipment, they apply to the secretary for variance from the rules, and I emphasize rules for a reason, and the secretary may grant a variance if he or she finds the variance proposed does not endanger, tend to endanger human health or safety, complies with the rules for which variance is sought with compliance with those rules will produce serious hardship without greater or equal benefits to the public, and the variance does not enable the applicant to generate, transport, treat, store or dispose of hazardous waste in a way that is less stringent than federal rickra. So the agency has said that they basically historically have never issued variances from statute under that subsection that they've only used it to provide variances from their discretionary authority under the rules to protect human health and the environment or prevent nuisances. And normally what they have provided variances for had been set back requirements or other operational controls that and they do not use it to provide variances to something that has been clearly articulated in statute as legislative policy. But there is a specific provision in the variance authority subsection B for those facilities that are subject to the management requirements of 6605, J2 or 3. And those are the universal recycling requirements for the residuals and food residuals. So there is specific variance authority for a facility that is subject to those requirements. And if the applicant demonstrates alternative services, including onsite management are available in the area served by the facility, the alternative services have capacity to serve the needs of all persons served by the facility requesting the variance and the alternative services are convenient, then the agency has the ability to issue a variance from the universal recycling requirements for leave residuals and food residuals for facilities. Now I want to note that any variance requires a notice and opportunity for public meeting requirements. An A&R must consider the relevant interest of the applicant versus the interest of interest of parties in the general public. And then the variance is granted for time periods and under conditions consistent with the reason subject to the request and subject to statutory limitations based on the reasons it was issued. So that's the variance authority. Does anyone have any questions? All right, I was hearing silence. I'm moving on. There's also waiver authority for commercial haulers. Now technically there are three waiver provisions, but really only one is of real broad application. But first let's look at what would be waived. So the requirements for commercial haulers are in G1A and B. And so beginning on July 1, 2015, a hauler shall offer to collect mandated recycles separate from other solid waste and deliver them to a facility maintained and operated for the management of mandated recycles. Similarly beginning on July 1, 2020, shall offer to non-residential customers and apartment buildings with four or more residential units, collection of food residuals separate from solid waste and deliver to a location that manages food residuals in a manner consistent with the food residual priority hierarchy. They are not required to offer collection of food residuals if another commercial hauler provides collection services for food residuals in the same area and has sufficient capacity to provide service to all customers. So right there, there is a provision that haulers don't need to provide services if there's alternative services in that area. So moving down to the waiver provisions, the first one sub B, sub two. This is really only in those municipalities, solid waste management entities that have... Michael, can I have a quick question on that section? You just finished going through with, you don't, a hauler does not need to offer collection services for food residuals in the same area if there's someone doing it and they have sufficient capacity. So one of the things that comes up from time to time in these discussions is the ability to subcontract. If there is someone else, so a hauler could subcontract that workout, does that, isn't, I was just trying to make sure that's still a valid way for them to meet the requirement. Someone else could provide that service on their behalf. Yes, I definitely think that subcontracting is an alternative for a hauler, the subcontracted hauler would likely need to meet all the permitting and certification requirements under statute. But if they do, I don't see any reason why a hauler can subcontract. I don't necessarily know if that affects that provision that allows the hauler not to offer a collection. If there was a service in the area, I think it would be up to A&R to make that determination for a commercial hauler. Okay, great. I mean, I think that's part of the challenge on some of this stuff is just to figure out if someone else is offering it, who makes that determination and how? So we'll come back to A&R to pass that question. Okay. Thank you. So that first waiver provision that's in those municipalities where solid waste services are being offered as part of municipal services. So a commercial hauler in that municipality is not required to comply with the requirements of universal recycling if the material addressed is addressed in a municipal ordinance. It's applicable to all residents. It prohibits a resident from opting out of the municipally provided services. And the municipality doesn't have a variable rate, i.e. they've incorporated the cost into their taxes. So that one's probably limited in application. Sub three is the broad waiver provision. A commercial hauler is not required to comply with one A or B, so mandated recyclables or food residuals. In a specified area and a municipality, if A&R has approved a solid waste implementation plan for the municipality for purposes of the waiver for mandated recyclables, the secretary determines that under the approved plan the municipality is achieving the per capita disposal rate. The municipality demonstrates that its progress toward meeting the version goal in the state solid waste plan is substantially equivalent to that of municipality complying with the requirements of the mandated recyclables. And then the approved municipal plan delineates an area where solid waste management services required for mandated recyclables or food residuals are not required. And in that delineated area there are alternative services, including on-site management. So on-site composting something that would need to be taken into consideration are offered and those alternative services have capacity to serve the needs of the residents. Then the fourth, there are actually the third waiver provision. A commercial hauler is not required to comply with the requirements of A or B, so mandated recyclables or food residuals collected as part of a litter collection program. So on green up day they don't need to separate food residuals from the rest of the solid waste that's collected. So that's waiver. I don't know if any haulers have applied for waiver under subdivision three there, but that if they were looking to do it would probably be their best alternative. Something just happened to my screen. There we go. All right, so in sub three there's emergency authorities. So generally the governor and the emergency management division have statutory authority to act to protect the public peace health and safety during times of emergency. Generally that applies in an all hazard event and an all hazard event includes natural disasters, civil insurrection, terrorist attacks, and health or disease related emergencies which I think we all agree a pandemic is. Now once the state of emergency is declared the governor has authorized exercise certain powers for as long as the governor determines the emergency to exist. These powers are set forth in title 20 and three different sections and include employing measures and giving directions to the state or local boards of health. I included that because the authority of the state or local boards of public health is pretty broad related to public health issues. They can declare public health hazards and basically require certain restrictive measures. The extent of the governor's emergency power is something of an open question. There have been courts around the country that are litigating that issue right now and there have been some varying opinions. For example in Texas a district federal district court said that the governor can infringe on and basically take away constitutional rights during a time of emergency whereas in Alabama the court said no it doesn't extend that far. Obviously there is some restriction on constitutional rights such as right to travel but the right is not taken away and so that issue has not been addressed squarely and by the Vermont Supreme Court or the federal district courts in the second circuit but the governor basically has broad authority. How broad is still kind of up in the air in this jurisdiction. There's also specific emergency authority for solid waste facilities and it's really it's fairly limited. It's when there there's need to be an emergency action for the disposal of solid waste the agency can issue a provisional certification. That's really I just included it there because if for some reason there's no ability to dispose of food residuals or manage food residuals in a facility somewhere in the state the agency has basically the ability to issue a provisional certification for it and for a limited time. And then for enforcement discretion enforcement discretion is not a statutory authority it's derived from the Constitution and common law judge made law precepts. Basically it extends from the take care clause of the Vermont Constitution and the concept of separation of powers. The take care clause it's it's a very short clause it basically says that the governor shall take care to execute the laws of the state but it has been interpreted to allow enforcement agencies discretion and enforcement of the law. And it's that kind of makes sense because you want agencies to have the ability to determine if when and how to enforce a law. An exercise of enforcement discretion is generally unreviewable by courts it's a separation of power things courts are going to go in and tell an agency when they have to enforce or how they're going to enforce that's really not the court's purview but an agency can't exercise enforcement discretion unconstitutionally for example discriminating against a protected class and they can't violate the general precepts of the enforcement discretion. The major precept of enforcement discretion is that it's supposed to be on a case-by-case individual basis you're supposed to apply the facts of an alleged violation to the law and to the situation at hand and to determine whether or not and how to enforce. So it's not supposed to generally be applied categorically it's not supposed to be there to undermine the legislative policymaking the legislature the legislature has a supreme legislative lawmaking authority and policymaking authority and agencies can't undermine that by choosing to categorically not implement enforcement of the law. And the greatest example most recent example of that is the Obama era DACA policy and for immigration policy where Obama said that they weren't going to enforce immigration laws to parents of undocumented parents of children who were born in the United States and they were going to grant deferred action status to immigrants well that wasn't the law at the time that wasn't what Congress said and the decision to categorically not enforce immigration laws was not within President Obama's authority and the court overruled him and said you can't use enforcement discretion to make law and policy that conflicts with Congress. And then last there's rulemaking authority the agency has a very broad grant of rulemaking authority under the solid waste management chapter it basically says that they have authority to adopt rules to implement the solid waste chapter and their universal recycling requirements are in that chapter. So agencies with rulemaking authority can adopt emergency rules when there is an imminent peril to public health safety or welfare. So theoretically A&R has the ability to adopt emergency rules to address the management of mandated recyclables or food residuals during the pandemic and the agency has specifically the Department of Fish and Wildlife has exercised emergency rulemaking to push some of its requirements during the pandemic. So the agency knows how to use emergency rulemaking to address an imminent peril to public health safety or welfare. Registry rules have a maximum duration of 180 days but Elkhart can object if it's beyond the agency the authority or inconsistent with legislative intent. So I would expect if the agency tried to wave entirely some of these universal recycling requirements or make certain broad exemptions that you'd probably have interested parties request that Elkhart object to such such an action. And then it would be up to Elkhart. I think at least two of you are on Elkhart so you know how that goes. Certain A&R programs have been delegated authority to adopt rules. I'm sorry I haven't provided context for this. In addition to just the A&R's general rulemaking authority there has been efforts in the past by the General Assembly to give an agency rulemaking authority to act during emergencies. If you remember during Tropical Storm Irene Governor Shumlin basically used his emergency authority which I already summarized to wave the stream alteration permitting requirements so that municipalities and others could go into streams and remove debris that was threatening infrastructure and threatening to cause more flooding. After Irene the legislature said well maybe when that happens for stream alteration there should be some parameters for how it happens. So the General Assembly gave A&R the ability to adopt rules to say what the expedited permitting or other requirements were during times of emergency for stream alteration. So that's an option for the legislature. If you want to and going prospectively if pandemic is going to be something that lasts more than a few months you could potentially give A&R rulemaking authority to address how they would manage solid waste issues during an emergency. So that's those are the options that are out there. I don't think I missed anything but you know the agency's rule is like 190 paid as long so there might be something in there that I missed. Kathy could probably correct me if anything on here is wrong. Mr. Chair. Senator McDonough. This has been quite fascinating and I'm asking for you to help us understand what our goal is today. I got just a couple questions. We learned yesterday that the haulers have made some what we many of us would say were common sense decisions to put off mattresses and electronic waste for an undetermined period of time as they seek some guidance on how to move forward. They may have been not complying with the rules but everybody has many people have said well that makes sense. They've made some common sense choices and they're ready to hear what we would have them do going forward. The second one is we've got the new separations coming up of food wastes from other materials that get hauled away starting on July 1st. If those had been in place two months ago before the pandemic we've been wrestling with whether or not the haulers should have stopped separating during this time period. So I guess I'm asking what is it that we would as a committee seek to achieve as the new statute goes into place on the 1st of July and what are perhaps two or three options that Mr. O'Grady might say are available to us. So thanks for those clarifying questions. You know my goal has been all along that we hear testimony so we understand what's going on in the field. Have a better then we will need to decide as a committee are we hearing things that make us feel so the requests are you know have merit we should we should accommodate some kind of altered practice whether it's not picking up something or not separating something but we only need I think to act on that as a committee if there's not already adequate discretion at the agency for accomplishing the same thing and so because I've only heard in bits and pieces some of these kinds of allowances before that's why I asked Michael to try to corral all that into one presentation so that we could better understand and we have agency with us to see if there's a request we've been hearing about that actually already would be could be accommodated through one of the six approaches that Mr. O'Grady just walked through. I I take took in my notes Mr. Chair one one sentence from yesterday's testimony having having to do with food waste that was perhaps the most interesting truth that was offered to us and it was sort of food waste it's going to be picked up one way or another and the question is the law on the 1st of July says it will just prescribes away in which it will be picked up under statute and it's going to be picked up one way or another is is the a possible course of action to allow the to to acknowledge that the administration may make a determination on this particular issue during the pandemic if the administration believes that it is the pandemic is affecting such a decision. Yeah well that certainly so I think maybe we should pause I know we only have Michael for another 32 minutes so thank you so no I think I'm not putting it off I'm just saying this would be a good idea I mean I think we're going to need to ask Commissioner Walk to weigh in so we can get a little bit of a discussion going back and forth here as to whether or not the six routes to providing for flexibility if we want to call it that if they don't accommodate the kinds of requests we heard yesterday. So then Mr. Chair is there any I guess we might look if there's any reason that the statute taking effect when the statute is supposed to take effect would in any way fort the governor's authority or recent generally approved practice of dealing with this COVID environment were he to make some changes in the rule in the law that's going to take place on the first of July and if so I mean that's our question is it not yes right thank you for pointing out also you know I had actually sort of gone right by and I hadn't thought of it as that solid waste districts were deferring accepting certain kinds of waste like electronic waste etc I hadn't thought about that but right normally they'd be required to do so so mattresses sofas things like that that that they're in doubt about and they're waiting for guides yep right right okay so um Commissioner Walk do you want to what's the you you've heard Mr. O'Grady's presentation is that your sense that the request that the agency is interested in responding to our can be accommodated under one of these six different approaches that Mr. O'Grady just walked us through sure and let me apologize in advance both to the committee and to Mike for my internet over the last half an hour has been its most spotty all for the last two months uh and so I just had to reset my router and uh and did not get as much of Mike's overview as I would have liked to have to have been able to you know fully answer that but I do have the document and have been reading through it um I and I appreciate the the the walkthrough I think the some of the the the primary variance piece that that Mike went through is really looking at issues and I appreciate that he highlighted the sort of issues with rules rather than with with statue obviously um you know there are pretty clear statutory requirements and then if we get into the question of of using enforcement discretion we have already used enforcement discretion to try to address issues and our goal with the use of that is as as he described what is to be very discreet in its use and uh only when absolutely necessary so in most contexts we've created an opportunity for people to avail themselves of it if it's needed but not necessarily uh have to have it occur if it's not needed so most of um the the specific policies we put forward have we have not gotten any requests uh to have individuals of our businesses avail themselves of those requirements um we did early on uh use enforcement discretion to primarily set to help assist groceries who would otherwise grocery stores would otherwise need to be uh collecting uh bottle bill uh bottles uh to be able to focus on stocking shelves um as you discussed yesterday most of those um facilities have gone back to the collection of of bottles and cans because um and as as senator parent alluded to I think at some point uh the you know different uh facilities have are actually looking for that content more and more because of its clean stream um and so I guess the requests that we made that were the proposed language that we put forward uh to this committee and to house natural resources what about a month ago was really to uh to seeking while you were in session your explicit authority in that policymaking realm um given that there were open questions uh and we didn't feel like there was the exact sort of fit between the flexibility and tools that you've given us and um and this situation and so the idea was to provide for that explicit authority I would divide those into sort of two categories one is the impending uh finalization of the of the food residuals ban uh which uh has primarily been around the ability of of haulers and facilities to prepare for that ban in this moment um there's also an economic question that is is for yours to for you to answer about whether or not it is a uh it how the burden falls relative to the other economic pressures on businesses in the state of Vermont um and then the second bucket is really how do we ensure the worker workforce is protected for haulers and for facilities and in the event of a situation where that that workforce becomes compromised are there are there flexibility measures that can be utilized to make sure that we're continuing to collect solid waste from Vermonters and Vermont businesses but uh not necessarily uh not in the same way as business as usual to make sure that we can continue to do that and those are really the the efforts that we put forward in order to have that conversation with you at the policy level I I I think that I'd be interested in Mr. Agri's perspective on which situations might uh that he's laid out might fit those um two categories best I think there's different ways to to look at it um certainly our legal counsel has taken a look and that's frankly why we put forward the language that we did so that would provide sort of a clean very clear direction from you um and that would only be used in a you know especially for the the collection and disposal requirement pieces would only be used in specific circumstances as needed sort of tightly defined the the I think so without starting to walk through the the exact language I think one of the concerns I had about well one is as a starting point if something's already accommodated through law or practice kind of whether it's statute rule constitutional provisions then I would say okay well let's not let's not let's not be duplicative or maybe even muddle things a little bit by sort of overriding or overlapping something you know if we can already do it um and so I think it's really that's sort of the conservative approach I'm taking it's not it's not like we're stonewalling it's like let's not metal if we've already in some form addressed it you know um that said the language I saw was it was quite broad like waving you know food residuals or recyclables and it was sort of class-wide there was nothing in that language that suggested that there would be an applicant asking for a waiver on a particular like a case by case basis so I'm just trying to understand how broad a brush ANR is asking to be you know sort of handed in this case that's that's fair it is our intent under the the way that's written and let me um if you'll give me a moment I'll pull that up but the the frankly the idea behind it being that it would be something that uh was a you know that the secretary granted upon request from a hauler or from a solid waste management district or you know swimming in general so that was that was the way it was conceived let me because I had to shut down all my tabs and restart my internet I'm a little I don't quite have all the information in front of me at the moment yeah well this is one of the one of the zoom downsides it's not sitting at a table with all the papers in front of us that we can just move seamlessly between I I appreciate that you know so maybe to be systematic about it one way to to do this would be to take Mr. O'Grady's memo and ask you if you're ready to do it now fine I mean I know it's it's um come whatever there's a lot of detail here maybe you haven't had enough time to consider it all but uh maybe we could walk through the six different um routes to flexibility whatever we call them and you can say whether or not you believe they offer ANR adequate flexibility or not just so we understand how you're reading them when I read these six in aggregate I feel like it's a pretty full toolkit that uh ANR could use in order to respond to um individual cases where you're seeing some you know perceiving a need to respond for either of those any of the reasons you think are valid um so you wanted how about we do that does that seem workable to you or if you not is that not a fair request because you haven't had enough time to look at Mr. O'Grady's memo I realize you're just looking through this now with us um I will do my best and but I think given the the time that we have available to us I'm happy to walk through and give my initial impression uh and hope that my legal counsel doesn't cringe as I speak from time to time so I would so starting with the the first category the sort of general variance um I think the the first section is really about uh variance from rules uh so the section A 1A there is is about variance from rules given that the requirements that we're discussing are laid out clearly in statute I think that's problematic from a direct variance perspective um in 1B it's um it's I don't and maybe Kathy can weigh in whether or not we've ever authorized a variance under 1B but it does seem like maybe not the most responsive to a public health crisis if we get to that point and that's really what we're talking about if we if we get to the point where we need to institute these sorts of measures um and so I would ask Kathy to weigh in and whether or not we've ever issued a variance we have um that 1B came from the original universal recycling law it was directed specifically to facilities only and we have um for example there were two Kosella transfer stations that were located really close by to where food scraps were already being locally uh collected so we were able to grant a variance to those two facilities for the collection of food scraps since it was already a convenient and um um uh sufficiently uh capacity for collecting food scraps in that area but it's facilities and right now I think the question before you was really with respect to hollers is that St. Aubens in Georgia um no um one was um um in um Williston and the other one was in Montpellier thank you um okay and the leading language in A all right sorry no never mind I was just thinking thinking about how it's it's broader for instance it includes a process and I don't know if collection is actually a process yeah um Michael and I had that discussion but we don't have holler requirements in our rules the holler requirements are only in the statute so and A is specifically about the rules as Michael pointed out yep thank you um um mr any you want to go on to category two waiver yes that seems seems appropriate thank you Kathy for weighing in um so the the category two really looks at the um the kind of off ramps for holler requirements that you've put into statute um around the universal recycling law and trying to understand how that might be used um I I think the we're because we're not in a uh fully implemented mandate status it's difficult for hollers to provide clarity or to to the agency around whether they can meet the the stipulations of those waivers um essentially we're in a chicken or an egg scenario um and so it's it's we may get to the point where where one of the compost collection only businesses expands into an area where uh where you know and they're looking to expand their collection but they're not there yet and therefore um would require a holler who might get to the point where they could apply for this waiver um can't do so yet because there isn't sufficient capacity to cover all of their customers okay um and is so that that capacity to provide service to all customers that bears on the holler I mean so if some is that correct in other words if someone says well uh someone who's collecting organic food residuals for a composting business directly someone like a grow compost for instance is going to all these businesses are operating statewide they seem to be growing if they're expanding into an area but they're only going to um larger institutions for instance does that our our hollers still required um under current law to also offer organics because they have customers and someone is not offering that service to their customers now that's what that's the chicken and egg thing I see is who who has the requirement to ensure first that um every customer who's at at the four units and above level has access the current hollers servicing those people I can offer something on that if you'd like please yes thank you okay um so um first of all this um requirement is not in effect until July one uh we have provided guidance on that um there isn't a process where um the holler has to get approval from A&R uh you know that the the waiver isn't um you know like a permit or anything but they need to be assured that um if they're not going to offer the collection of food scraps to their you know non-residential customers it's the only requirement um that there's someone else that can in that area we have offered to help them make that determination if they'd like we're very much informed about you know who is offering services in which areas remember all solid waste hollers including food waste hollers have to get a permit from us and we are collecting information and keeping track of who is offering food waste collection in which areas um so we're happy to assist hollers in making that determination and I think this is going to continue to expand you know you heard um grow compost say yesterday that they're operating in many of these maybe all the counties and maybe they're not hitting every town um there are business opportunities where other hollers are also trying to get into the game so it is evolving and uh I don't want to get too far into the weeds but the second half of that section two waiver uh then G1B the last sentence commercial haulers shall not be required to offer collection services etc is that constrained to just uh non-residential customers or is that referring to all customers in other words residential right down right so sorry well just that it are we talking about it's that it's residential customers and you know right down to the single household level no the the residential customers um were removed from the hollers requirement last year statutorily okay so they have to offer the service only to their non-residential customers or apartment buildings with four or more units okay and so that's that's the um the the group that we're looking at for them to provide the service to all right so um I know we're constrained on time so it's we're we're not going to sort it all out today but if um sort of permission or if you could continue on with anything else you want to talk about in category two there waiver from commercial hauler collection requirements I think we pretty much addressed that one um I think there is that obviously we've worked to put guidance in place to make that process as as seamless as possible but as a as a business owner I would feel somewhat at risk of being out of compliance if I wasn't sure that I could guarantee that an alternative existed to provide service to all of my customers I think that is something that we need to be very very mindful of as we go forward okay and how about sub three in that same waiver collection so beginning with a commercial hauler is not required to comply with the requirements it's on Mr. O'Grady's page three well I don't know I have a strange page break here but anyway that that version that I think he actually indicated might be one of the more approachable ways of coming at this if they if a hauler wanted to make a request is that the swift provision I don't have that document that is that is the swift provision okay so yeah that's original um universal recycling law um and because there can be and most of the time are more than one hauler operating in an area um they wanted to have a process where um all haulers either have to provide the service or don't provide the service so um we um so it has to go through the the solid waste implementation process which is either the district or lines or independent town um and come to the agency as a revised whip for review and approval um this process was used for northeast kingdom um originally five years ago six years ago when they wanted to be exempt from the haulers of providing pickup of recyclables and they were approved for that that waiver through the swift process I will share that many of the haulers and some of the swimmies bind it to be a bit of an awkward process and that's why last year we changed the requirement so that um the haulers were only required to pick up food scraps from the non-residential um customers that was the compromise remember um that's what it stopped being universal and became bifurcated yeah um but I think the the the key point um that Kathy's raised is that that could be a process that would work it's a it's probably a timeline question um and and whether or not uh the that a a district or a uh a laxer in independent town could get together and revise their plan submit their plan have us review their plan in a in a way that uh was timely um for a public health emergency okay um I can imagine that would take some some time so then if we move ahead uh to emergency authority how applicable do you see that category three um as providing a remedy to these situations particularly since we're operating under uh an emergency order right now uh I I think that it it is something that uh I don't like I think as as Mike described what the limits of that authority are are not entirely clear uh could it be used probably but that's in my mind it's really four things that are are uh needed on a true imminent uh risk sort of basis um I think the Irene example is a good one um in my mind if we have the as we've had the time for a deliberative legislative policy discussion to determine whether a tool is needed uh then it's probably does not necessarily uh uh fit as well with this category okay um the the public health piece of it I think is you know maybe the most persuasive reason for for considering waivers and that seems like in the midst of a pandemic a public health a judgment made by the governor on the basis of public health impacts would would seem like a good fit to me but let's let's not debate them all just I understand I mean is there a reason that doesn't seem appropriate I'm not saying it doesn't it doesn't fit or doesn't seem appropriate it's a question of whether it's necessary given that we have the the having this discussion right now okay if if if we had uh issues where haulers were dealing with public health uh or with with with issues impacting their workforce so that we had the potential risk of uh of solid waste being courted in people's homes then yes I would I would immediately move forward with you know pursuing something along those lines that might be appropriate in the instance where we've had time to have this deliberate conversation as we're on the on the down slope of our first uh wave of this pandemic then we have the opportunity for this conversation to move forward in a in a deliberate process which I think is what we're doing here today and so that that that's sort of where where I make you know it would it would be something we could potentially use um it it's not it's not a it's not it's not an authority that should be used lately okay um since we only have five more minutes with Michael can we just touch base briefly on the the next uh there remain the I think for four as as Mike mentioned I think the um the the it really is about permitting uh emergency facilities um and I don't think it would apply particularly well here um uh I'm going to touch on uh number six first and then we'll come back to enforcement discretion because I think that's that we're in need of the discussion could lie uh for rulemaking we're we have rulemaking authority to uh clarify your statutory guidance um and I think that uh that since the statute is very clear it would be difficult for us to or you know I don't know if we have the authority to write uh roles that would uh run counter a statute right okay um and then for enforcement discretion um that really is a is facility and holler specific and it's retrospective in nature um we are choosing not to enforce upon an alleged violation after it's occurred when we put out authority um when we put out guidance um in this moment it's been about saying tell us if you are going to run up against issues where you're going to fall out of compliance and so that if it meets these criteria then then we will use enforcement discretion but it is it is primarily retrospective in nature and doesn't uh address threats we know to be to be coming that well okay or could potentially be coming um senator mcdonnell do you have a question um no I we're we're we have a lot that's supposed to take place on the first of july and this first of july is no different than the several times we have postponed the implementation of this law um we've even taken the law which was really universal um pick up and made it um and bifurcated it and made it uh not universal anymore and we're still talking about not having it go into effect um this is business as usual um usually at this time the haulers come in and say we don't have the trucks to do this please don't do it now and we say well we'll extend it for you so you can get the trucks and then a couple years later they come back with the same argument um why there there is the the testimony is that if they're picking up solid waste apparently from homes they're picking it up now and if they after the first of july they're gonna pick up food waste um why if we delay at this time two years from now there'll be another reason not to do it perhaps is a blessing in this case that there's this health emergency because if it takes a place on the first of july the haulers will know they gotta get the trucks and maybe the this virus business will give them a couple months to um do what they have to do to be ready if we just simply postpone it it'll be back again two years from now with we're not ready to do it so um glad to see senator rogers has joined us because my district probably demographically is the same as his and it's going to be a lift but um we keep we said we made the lift almost a decade ago someone will correct me and we postponed that and and um watered it down a couple times since then and um i don't see why this um it shouldn't take place on the first of july thank you um i think before we go to senator rogers i just quick question to clarify something that commissioner walk said just a moment ago and that is um they asked he said that he wasn't sure that the governor had the authority to do this and perhaps that it was a wise and thoughtful thing to ask the governor to have to make and um i would i understand that and i would say most from ours have been generally pleased with the decisions he's been made in such circumstances here um mr or grady had to leave i'm sorry i don't get to say thanks and we'll have to follow up with him when his next week uh no it was commissioner walk it was the the question was um that you were talking about that enforcement discretion is retrospective uh and the i understand that you know right i mean practically making someone has to fail to comply before there is your the situation even arises but somehow with redemption centers for instance everyone knew kind of prospectively that there wasn't going to be enforcement so i'm just wondering if you know there it can work both ways depending on how it's articulated by the agency i don't disagree with you and that and we we put um we put clarity out there and have during the course of this emergency for specific sectors so that they do in the instance of coming up against a requirement whether or not they would be out of compliance or held you know how we would pursue that being out of compliance that that's true we're um but what i guess the the question becomes we took that action because it felt like something that we could do in the immediate term to be able address an immediate need um so that we could focus on keeping food on shelves and is the sorry i have i need a some legal help here the provision that specifies that someone's selling has to redeem is that in rule or in statute that's in statute so our our enforcement discretion applies to both statute and to rule that you know and as as michael went through it's you know it's it's it's not necessarily explicit in all forms it comes from uh from constitutional and common law practices but the um so yeah so it so yes that was in law um that is not a it's it's not something that i want to open us up to using on a broad basis and as a stand in for your your policy discussions that makes sense and the other quick check in on that same issue is for the sound waste districts that uh stopped accepting mattresses and electronics stuff like that is that in statute or rule and was that articulated sort of prospectively to those folks so that they knew they could stop doing that reduce that exposure for their employees and um there wouldn't there wouldn't run into any kind of legal problems i'm gonna let kathy speak to that because she looks eager so um you might recall that um with the um uh state of emergency and stay home stay safe order that there was a defined um list of essential services and for solid waste those were defined as trash municipal solid waste uh food scraps and recycling the mandated recyclables those three items only um and we didn't want to have um um vermoners having extra more than needed direct contacts with other people and that's why we were um not um allowing the other types of waste materials to be collected at that point in time it was to pair it with essential services okay and mr chair we we've generally been pleased with the administration's ability to make judgments like this and um they've years from now they're still so self is not being removed that's a different matter but so i don't see these and these are requirements a lot of what we did was about operating hours and other things and those are specifically in their facility certifications yeah right um and so it is it is a bit more specificity beyond which you have weighed in from a legislative policy perspective and on july 1st should this should the statute go into effect um there's an opportunity for the administration to show the same wisdom restraint and uh and decision making during this emergency uh thank you uh senator rogers you've been patiently waiting your turn uh yeah just a couple more uh comments um based on what senator mcdonnell said the the waste dollars aren't not buying new trucks because they don't want new trucks they're not buying new trucks because the business model doesn't make any money especially in the rural areas you heard even jeff meyers who has lots of urban areas say that he's not buying the new trucks everybody's making less money right now and and we're mandating uh people to go out and change their business on a business model that doesn't work financially and and in this time with less money moving around the system it's even harder for them to make those changes a lot of the solid waste haulers are still paying for the changes they made to meet the recycling requirements which also don't pay remember recycling's free um so you know i i just think that the the agency has been behind the eight ball in organizing the implementation of everything in what is now like what at 148 it's like a 10 year or eight years ago since we've been implementing and or not but um you know quite frankly throwing um i've been composting since i was a small child so it's nothing new to me um and and a lot of people can do it but the worst thing in the world today is not that a few food scraps continue to go into the landfill for another couple months or a few pieces of plastic go into the landfill for another couple of months they're better off in the landfill than they are in the ocean the bottom line is given the flexibility so that if there are health concerns they can be dealt with um but i don't think there's anybody out there who doesn't want to implement all this but how can people create infrastructure and buy new trucks when the business model does not make money um senator campion just want to go back to also what we heard yesterday we did hear from somebody who did create a business uh who's interested in this kind of work so i don't want to lose sight that there are organizations companies starting and have been preparing for this uh this um you know the start of this and they too keep getting delayed um so they're not delayed they can still pick it up ryan right so right they could still pick it up and so what was their concern yesterday why are they they're not interested in having this delayed i mean that was their point i mean i don't think they got on here yesterday just to make a point because everything's going really well for them it seemed to me that one of the things that they're they said was that you know this has been an expectation this has been something that's been put forward eight or nine years ago and it's not helping them and it's not helping others to have a continually continuously pushed off but they're in the business of making money from it where the solid waste haulers that you heard from yesterday who are asking for the flexibility it is going to be a huge cost to them and so for anybody who has ever run a business there's a giant difference but how is it not going to be a huge cost how would it not have been a huge cost a year ago two years ago are you looking to nobody just not do it i i don't understand i mean this it just seems to me that it's always a huge cost why is it more of a cost right now why are you are you looking for delay or you're just looking to get rid of it so are we saying it's okay to put people out of business that's not my question senator are you looking for a delay of six months are you looking for this just to disappear is everybody going to be on board in another six months if there's a business model that makes money they would be what the state has asked is for them to implement a business model that does not make money and in some places in the state the infrastructure is not in place and so it's made it's a huge difference if you've got a compost facility and you're making money on compost and you're charging people to dump there of course it's a good business model for you if you have to go out and buy new trucks and run rural routes where you're only picking up a little scrap here and a little scrap there and then you have to haul it two hours to a compost facility and pay them 80 a ton to dump it there you're losing money on it and we're so we're forcing people to go into a money losing business and we're going to put some of them out of business that's why they haven't bought the new trucks they can't afford the new trucks and so you're saying that the law itself just should never go into a fall there you have the agency should have done more work on the ground to make sure that there were facilities in every part of the state and that we were working on infrastructure so that it could be implemented without costing some people a huge amount to try to implement it the business model probably works fine in Chittenden County in Montpelier in the the urban areas it does not work in the rural areas there you have it Mr. Chair that that's the thank I'm glad Senator Rogers joined us because that's the scope of our decision um and we we haven't heard today during this discussion and if we implement this then people are going to go up on the back roads and the foul them with trash because they have no other choice um but that's what we have before us and we're either going to move to the next step and put horses out of business and replace them with automobiles or not so I have a quick honestly a quick question for Senator Rogers when you say the business model doesn't work because haulers are allowed to charge for you know pick up for anything they're picking up whether it's residuals recyclables trash um why what's your understanding I guess you're not a hauler so you can't really answer the question but you may have considered this why are they not able to adjust rates to put themselves back in the black because they figure if they set the rates where they need to to make money they're gonna piss off their customers and and they're it's just it's a it's a tough sell and furthermore they would have more competitive rates if they didn't have to haul the stuff two and a half hours like some other districts in the state but their customers have to participate have to have to actually compost we heard from the we heard from the haulers that there's a ton of people out there that are not complying with the existing law the agency hasn't even enforced the existing law and we're asking for for more to go into effect when there's when there's no enforcement so would it be helpful then you know again for this to be enforced that way it will actually help the haulers themselves to make sure that people are signing up to have their organics transported away and those that don't you know we compost here in our backyard and they'll do it that way Mr. Chair yeah we still have we're we're not going to solve this and then remain of this meeting and perhaps we should all come back home and compost this idea for a little while and see what when we're going to come out yes the center i i want to do two things one center parent has been listening all morning and now patiently give him a turn here patiently i was going to say too i mean no matter what you do you can't enforce it at the smallest level you know i think of i have two apartment buildings and i have tenants even though i remind them monthly to recycle they don't recycle and it ends up in the dumpster i'm putting compost barrels out for them by July 1 but i can guarantee you they're not going to use them and how do i you know how do we enforce that i mean i'm using compost now and i think the law allows you know i wouldn't pay for it and what i worry about what senator roger's talking about is they're going to put that flat fee on every customer whether your compost they're picking up your compost or not they're going to raise their rates even if you've decided to invest you i've invested five hundred dollars in compost barrels for my apartment buildings myself because it's a fixed cost and i can i can do that but i don't want to have my other rates go up to cover this cost after i made that fixed investment sure um so uh on the call we have still two folks to hear from that couldn't participate yesterday susan alexander and kim crossby who have been patiently waiting i want to do two things so one i give the agency a an opportunity to respond to the whole enforcement issue or allegations of lack of enforcement i don't know if you want to say something about that before we move forward i mr commissioner thank mr chair i'm not going to weigh heavily into the enforcement discussion that's been part of your conversation this entire time over the last eight years about what the agency's role as the trash police is and i think it's we can we can have a full-thrown conversation about enforcement and what we want that to look like but we can't say it's not being enforced in one instance that we don't want you to enforce in another um in the same conversation without going into more depth there so right yeah well was it really on our com it wasn't on the agenda for today so fair enough but i just wanted to make sure that that wasn't presented as fact and you didn't have a chance to say something in response so before we hear from susan alexander who's from uh lamoille salloway's district and um kim crossby on behalf of kasella i had also asked um gen duggan who was former general counsel at a and r who was also interested in the issue and was speaking to the committee yesterday to to join us again today um looking she's heard the conversation so far and maybe uh as someone who's uh operated both inside and outside this this issue um inside the agency and outside the agency if you have any thoughts you want to share based on what you've heard so far this morning senator gray before we go on to miss duggan uh you said presented as fact it it is a fact based on the people on the ground doing the work and so i take some offense to uh the question of whether it is fact or not when we had at least two of our special interest um guest yesterday uh misrepresent facts and i was the only one calling them on it so it it's a little offensive to to to question the people on the ground that are picking up the garbage who actually see the violations happening and i'm not saying i want the a and r to be the garbage police and go out there and find restaurants and and folks that are um maybe not able to afford another bill okay well of course it's never my intent to offend the reason i use the word allegation is because for us in this case we want to be careful i think legally when we hear testimony like that is for us hearsay you know we don't have we're not out there doing police work to ascertain whether or not people are or are not doing things so i just want to say we have to take many things we hear with a grain of salt until we dig into them and collect um evidence as opposed to sort of more casual anecdotal stuff so i'm just trying to not not make legal assertions that sound rather legal what we don't we don't quite have the basis for doing that that's all i'm just trying to be careful about it so uh miss dougan thank you mr chair um i will keep it brief but just a a few quick thoughts after listening to the conversation this morning i think we talked about this yesterday but i think it's really important to continue to be very clear about what the problem is that we're trying to solve i think the conversation continues to get confused about what is a covet impact and what is something that has been a concern for years um and you know i think that that really shows up when you're talking about workforce protections and public health i think that we heard yesterday and the takeaway from the cdc and industry guidance is that we can protect frontline workers um you know with common sense protections and so if the concern is public health for the workforce you know that seems to have solutions if we're concerned that we may lose staff because staff is getting sick that's more of a facility specific problem and not an industry-wide problem and so when you start getting into situations where there's a particular business or a facility impacted directly by you know the pandemic a public health emergency then you really are into um enforcement discretion box you know what we what the agency is asking for is very broad it's not tailored it's not requiring someone to stand up and say this is how it's impacting me we haven't really heard um we haven't really heard about industry-wide impacts in fact we're hearing from some facilities everything is going fine other businesses are ready to start july 1st so it seems to me like this is something that would warrant a case by case approach which is you know enforcement discretion is an appropriate tool for that if it's exercised in accordance with the guidelines and the parameters that mr o'grady laid out um the other the last thing i just want to make sure that the committee is aware of and i i don't think that mr o'grady mentioned this but anr has already issued a general enforcement discretion policy so they've already given guidance to regulated entities in terms of how they're going to go about exercising enforcement discretion um and it's very specific um it requires that the person that is you know that is seeking to um to have that waiver they have to show the burden is on them to show a couple of things um non-compliance was unavoidable because of the pandemic it didn't result in a significant public health or environmental threat they took steps to mitigate the harm they notified anr and they're immediately working with anr on a schedule to come back into compliance so the agency has already put that guidance out there um and i'm i'll i'm happy to send the committee you know a copy of that document and they've already shown that they can issue specific guidance where there's a a covid issue like bottle redemption centers or that's posted it's public it's transparent and they're being very specific it's narrowly tailored it's time limited um so those are just a couple of my observations from listening to the conversation this morning i think that the agency has the tools that they need to address facility by facility case specific challenges with compliance and i haven't really you know i haven't really heard sort of industry-wide covid impacts um and then again i would just urge the committee members to be really clear about what the problem is that we're trying to tackle if it's a long-term issue these are really important issues that we need to you know that the state needs to talk through and address but it's it's really problematic to lump it in under a covid-19 umbrella and that's where i think the confusion is happening thank you um it seems like one uh it's always helpful to have a legal organized legal thinking applied to defining a problem sorting it out so um and you know your thanks for the reminder too about that letter the committee has seen it it came up very early in the the whole pandemic timeline and the secretary sent us a copy and we had a presentation from secretary Moore and commissioner walk back i forget close to when we left the building not not long after as you have your hands on that document right now and i don't um can you just send it to jude and then uh i'll ask her to circulate it to everyone so we'll have a second we'll have a copy at hand without having to dig through committee online day by day files to to find the thing sure i i would please the the committee and miss dug and i am happy to provide it as a sort of official document from the agency if that would be more helpful sure and thanks thanks for that offer so jude when you get it from the commissioner can you please send it around to everyone thanks and i would just note that you know that policy really lays out you know some really important factors about how to look at and evaluate case by case um compliance issues within you know the context of this pandemic that those guided that those criteria the burden shifting on the applicant that seeking the waiver all of that is missing from the anr proposal related to the waiver of the you know the recyclables so i think it's important to compare what anr is proposing now to that those criteria and the policy right all right thank you for thank you for that yeah i it has seemed to me like um under the covid situation has brought the issue back to the forefront again but then other issues are sort of jamming their way through the door along with covid to say hey while you're talking about that i have an ongoing concern that i want to get back on the table so it's uh it has not been helpful to have that things getting conflated absolutely um committee do you have does anyone have uh questions for miss duggin all right so thank you again for um your help and we'll continue to work so committee with uh we have two witnesses who weren't able to join us yesterday and i said that we would roll some time over to today so i would like to invite um miss crossby to join us and then we'll hear from susan alexander as well um so good morning kim good morning can you hear me yes ma'am oh great well good morning or afternoon but this point um thank you for allowing me to come on today um i'm listening to the last hour and a half and it does seem like there's a lot of um confusion between some historical issues with the university recycling law getting mixed in with the covid-19 pandemic and i just i just would like to be clear that our request was strictly based on the covid-19 pandemic and wasn't meant to bring up these historical issues although i do think there clearly are some that do need to be addressed um but for the record uh kim crossby an environmental compliance manager with kasella um i've been working in the environmental field since i graduated from johnson state college with a degree in environmental science i'm one of the few members of my graduating class that continue to use their degree i've spent my entire working career in the environmental field because i recognize the importance and the value of protecting the environment and public health um i've been with kasella for 14 years and i'm proud to work for a company that shares and exhibits the same values um so i'd like to start again by clarifying the intent of our original ask because it appears that maybe our request has been taken out of context um we're not asking for a sweeping rollback or a dramatic or expansive change to the universal recycling law and we're not asking for a blanket approval to just start disposing of recycling that we collect we were simply asking for the secretary to have flexibility to approve disposal of mandated recyclables only in certain circumstances where and when disposal would be warranted due to the pandemic we're asking for the same flexibility that we have in other states that we operate in and it's the same flexibility that we asked for and received back in 2008 when the legislature approved disposal of mixed paper after china implemented the national sword program stopping the importation of mixed paper from the united states we did everything we could during that time to continue to move mixed paper to other markets so fortunately we did not have to ask the secretary for approval and nonetheless the authority was there in the event that we needed to use it and that's what we're really asking for here i view this is more uh a press for flexibility is more of a contingency plan being put in place only during a state of emergency nothing nothing on a permanent level um kasella has made significant investments into recycling infrastructure across our footprint and more recently invested into a recycled butter campaign educating people on what does and what doesn't belong in their recycling bin we also collaborated with the agency on their recycle like you live here campaign um also due to the closure of all but one of the residential drop-offs operated by cfwd kasella set up a fast trash operation to the town of milton so residents could have a place to bring their trash and recycling right right now residents are generating the most waste due to the stay at home order so we thought it was imperative that they have a place to bring the material so so we're not again we're not looking to just start disposing of recycling that's why i bring up those those points as far as the safety of our employees we are continuing to follow the safety guidelines issued by the cdc and the vermont department of health our employees have completed the training that was distributed by the department of health at the end of april and our safety team has done a great job in ensuring that our people working on the front lines are kept safe by wearing proper ppe that includes gloves glasses high visibility vests and face masks we have been fortunate that we have been able to supply our employees with ppe especially considering that there was a shortage of these items um and we know that other hollers have struggled to obtain ppe for their workers so so i don't think it's necessarily an issue of hollers not wearing the proper ppe it's the issue of the holler having trouble getting it um we're also requiring our drivers and our attendants at all of our all of our employees to practice social distancing from customers and co-workers frequently sanitize or wash their hands use wipes and implement additional cleaning practices at all of our facilities all our facilities have remained open we didn't we didn't scale back on collecting items like electronic waste because we were concerned that might encourage improper disposal of those items um to reiterate our previous testimony provided for this committee and the house our greatest concern is for the safety of our employees which has fortunately in Vermont remained healthy so far and that can really be attributed to the efforts gasella has made to ensure their their safety um we also worked with the agency to develop some guidance on things residents could do to protect sanitation workers on the front line and that was developed into a segment that was shown on wcax a few weeks ago um as far as asking for a delay on the food waste ban um as i stated during my testimony at the end of march we were fully prepared to implement the last phase of the ban we were we were in the process of developing a marketing plan that we would provide to our customers that would detail their options for managing food waste um obviously that plan has been placed on hold due to the state of emergency and is also pending on the outcome of this discussion um the businesses that already are included in the ban on food waste and residents that have already been diverting food waste can continue to do that a delay wouldn't mean that they have to stop diverting their waste um i'm not necessarily concerned with residents that can backyard compost because studies have shown that a majority of people in Vermont are already doing that and it's likely they will continue to do that with or without a ban because they believe in it what i'm concerned about is the residents that live in state housing assisted living or apartment buildings where backyard composting is not an option and they don't have the ability to bring their food waste to a local drop-off also concerned about the smaller businesses and that includes some restaurants that have not already fallen under the ban because they either didn't generate enough material or because they were not located within 20 miles of a certified facility as hollers mentioned yesterday curbside food waste collection would impose an additional cost during a time when many of us are participating in conversations on ways to defray costs particularly for small businesses um lastly i would like to address a comment that was made yesterday that an entity and that an entity that operates a landfill would want to delay the ban so they could continue to gain revenue in the form of titsies we have been diverting food waste years before the universal recycling law was passed an entire division of our company is dedicated to managing organics are asked for delay with based on the concern for our employees having to handle additional containers and others concern for our customers from an additional cost perspective it was not an attempt to get more tons of the landfill um just because we have expressed a difference of opinion that collecting food waste particularly in rural areas and transporting it long distances provides little environmental benefit and does not make sense from an economic standpoint does not mean that we are not supportive of diversion it's weak feel or see that a process is not sustainable we reserve the right to speak up on that and i will still stand by that the landfill gas energy facility at the landfill that powers 7 000 homes 24 7 is an excellent way to manage organics in an area that is currently lacking infrastructure so with some form of enforcement discretion or emergency authority is possible and more preferable than a delay then let's you know let's continue to have the discussion on what that looks like how it will work who it will apply to because i think that process is going to need to be well understood um we felt it may be easier to request a delay because the process does seem complicated especially based on what i heard today um and i'd just like to add that i'd be happy to contribute to those discussions as necessary and with that i'll take any questions okay uh thank you are there any community questions i do have one i don't know if you saw um the agency of natural resources uh provided a a model and spreadsheet um that analyzed greenhouse gas impacts of hauling uh organics continuing to be landfill versus being hauled um i think it was actually perhaps to heartland and then purchased getting into the alternate stream there um and they were do you have any i mean uh it was um and i think it actually included the carbon footprint of then this is the current i think temporary practice of then going all the way on to main and it was still a net positive have you seen that spreadsheet it came up only i got the last day we were in the building yes i i have seen that um that's the warm model um that they used there are a lot of assumptions that are used in that type of model um and as dr. Fauci recently said models that use assumptions are only as good as the assumptions put in them so i would i would question a lot of the assumptions that were used um that model depends on on many the outcome of those models depend on a lot of factors you know what type of what type of truck was used um the miles per gallon moisture content um there's a lot of factors that i would i would i would want to know more detail on sure um i i sure go ahead and point will take and i would totally agree with that all models are uh what they include assumptions great and i yeah don't dispute that at all i do have a really a beginner question i've as we've heard concerns expressed about hauling organics uh you know significant distances to get them into a sort of a proper handling stream um uh what occurs to me is that in the state we haul trash all from far away to coventry and i you know for the most part people have accommodated that is that's the way we've closed local landfills we made a decision we haul trash you know from one side of the state to the other um and that practice seems okay so i don't know why it is that separating out food residuals and then they may also have a significant hauling overhead built into them but why is why is trash different than organics in terms of the hauling well the the truck that picks up your trash at your house isn't the same truck that's driving it to the landfill from say from brattle borough or bennington that truck goes to a transfer station where it's offloaded and combined with other waste from other routes loaded into a long haul a trailer a long haul tractor trailer that's designed for long distance traveling and that's not the that's not the way that food waste is currently working it's mostly small trucks collecting that waste and then bringing it right to a certified facility i mean why was the 20 mile radius put in place back in 2011 or 2012 because was it was it because of distance from from traveling food waste around or was it from a cost or you know what there must have been a reason why why you were acquiring a 20 mile radius for food waste to be traveled and now that's going to be gone july 1st so so now we we were considering four about environmental impacts and carbon footprint when we had a 20 mile radius in place and now suddenly that's being removed but but again i think i think that is not covid related that is a that's another conversation that's been another argument that's been in place for a long time okay um i don't think it's very cost effective to to drive it that far and i think when you start looking at them at the carbon emissions but you're i don't want to cut you off but i want to get an answer because we kathy jamison i think was part of that discussion and she probably has some historical information she can share with us um miss jamison right so with respect to the 20 mile distance that was put in the original law right um we borrowed it from connecticut who used it first um and it was its main purpose was not environmentally related it was so we could develop infrastructure throughout the state we didn't want to have just one composting facility statewide we wanted to have regional facilities and so that was an incentive to build infrastructure it was not based on any um environmental assessment okay great so i'm mindful of the clock and i also we have um still waiting to join us is um uh susan whose last name i'm losing track of sorry um are you still there you are susan alecander thank you you're a very patient person um and it's also timely that you're here to join the conversation in a moment where food residuals are coming back up into the conversation so if you since we haven't had you in committee this year if you could just introduce yourself to folks and and then share um the information that you'd like us to be aware of thank you certainly thank you uh senator bray and all committee members you guys have been hanging in there for a long time i've been listening to this testimony and finding it fascinating uh so thank you for offering me this opportunity my name is indeed susan alecander and for the past 10 years i have been managing the lamoille regional solid waste district prior to that i uh worked in environmental consulting for 15 years and i have owned and operated my own business um little quick short background about the solid waste district in lamoille we um operate six drop-off facilities um including a redemption center we also have a composting facility that we opened um in anticipation of the requirements of act 148 uh 17 of our 20 employees do have face-to-face interactions with hundreds of customers every day so we are boots on the ground working with the materials that we're all been talking about today so the use of personal protective equipment ppe is not unique at all to these times of COVID-19 it is indeed part and parcel of our daily operations because we handle over a million beer cans bottles every year thousands of tons of trash and recycling and our drop-offs and hundreds of tons of the protestable food scraps that are composting facilities our employees following standard industry operating procedures every day don their nitrile gloves eye protection they wear uniforms use sanitizers and more we have more protections in place because they deserve protection of all kinds of flus viruses and other pathogens this is part of our industry and they have always existed in our waste materials and as i heard yesterday which i think is really important in this conversation is to parse out the elements of the testimony you're hearing those that are unique to the coronavirus and those are sort of the long-standing and ongoing objections to the requirements of act 148 so here are the facts that i understand of coronavirus every trade association or government agency guidance that i've read and researched and that includes the solid waste association of north america swana the largest and most well-regarded trade industry and r.r.a which is a regional new england recycling and resource management association uh national osha and statewide osha they all say that basic personal protective equipment there is no need to close nor to suspend operations and in addition to these ppes that there are actually administrative and engineering controls that are easily and inexpensively implemented to further protect both our employees and our customers in addition the vermont league of cities of two uh the cities and towns which um most municipalities use as um their insurer and as we all know insurance companies do not like to lose money uh they um employ regiments of actuaries to evaluate risks so i looked to these professionals and last week they released a guidance to us that um those of our employees who have face-to-face um contact with the public are at a moderate risk those who have administrative and or field duties where there is no face-to-face operation or interaction face a very low risk of contracting and transmission of covid 19 and in no case were any solid waste um employees listed as high risk in addition the department of health as you've been hearing earlier has a very broad authority and um we pay very much close attention to what the department of health and dr levine are saying and as he is now um advising the governor to slowly open up our state we're paying attention very close attention and there hasn't been any guidance from the department of health that concerns us in terms of covid so these are the experts we have reviewed and researched the recommendations we've implemented some of their suggestions and we just have to trust their guidance as it appears to be working so those are the covid facts i'd like to speak a little bit now to um act 148 it was eight years ago that the entirety of the vermont legislator legislature both the senate and the house voted unanimously to pass this law and the brilliance of this law was that it slowly implemented in phases the requirements that were um surrounding organics uh diversion to allow time to plan to build collection hauling infrastructure and to educate the public and customers so at lamoille we took that mandate very seriously as did many private and public entities across the state we spent 175 thousand dollars renovating an abandoned property turned it into a model local composting facility we now call lamoille soil where we are selling out of compost so quickly in the last two years we've collected over 225 tons of food scraps both from our facilities but also we do have commercial haulers who are out there picking up at institutions small businesses and residents alike so every year we've revisited this conversation and everything i've heard in the last couple days testimony and for the past six years hasn't changed that fact that that it is possible to manage your food scraps separately from your trash and we have a number i think i have at least four haulers in our district who are picking up and delivering food scraps from residents and small businesses alike so we're not alone though in advancing these priorities of equine 48 collectively around the state the vermont solid waste managers association represents 91 of our population 91 percent of the state's population and they've invested thousands of hours in programs committed significant resources i sent and i believe john leddie from northwest who represents the vermont solid waste managers association has sent you that list and i'm just going to highlight a few of those things that um to illustrate the investment that's been made 22 000 home composting units have been sold 260 backyard composting workshops have been conducted to teach the proper techniques there are over 100 drop-off points right now for food scraps that are being developed through the throughout the state 2500 businesses 200 schools have received technical assistance six composting facilities have been developed with district funds or by partnering with private sector and four districts have developed collection systems within their region that include residential and commercial drop-off the other thing i just want to mention here is that um when we hear people say that the model isn't working it's because they're trying to fit you know the proverbial square peg into the round hole and really it's just time to think about doing this model a little bit differently if you think about how we approach the local foods and the farm to table program in years past we as a state committed and we spent a lot of money and expertise helping people develop models for improving the production and delivery of local foods around the state and look where we are now five or six years later it's pretty remarkable and many of us are actually relying on that right now and we don't want to be out going to our grocery stores in public the tipping fee at our facility is $35 a ton what we pay to deliver trash and what and recycling to transfer stations can easily be above $100 a ton right now it's $128 a ton for us to deliver our recyclables to the the cassava transfer station in Hyde Park so when you look at a business model you got to wonder how we can't factor in maybe lower density routes or longer distances against those unequal tipping fees so I know you've got plenty to think about and I don't want to take up any more your time I just want to leave you with a few thoughts which is that any of the changes that you suggest or consider making to act 148 now will seriously undermine all those efforts that we have collectively both private sector and public sector have invested in the last few years it will considerably jeopardize those haulers who are already offering food scrap collection and when you are small business starting out you are operating a margin the one thing that COVID has clearly done is reduce those margins so let's not zero that out completely by making changes that will negatively impact those existing haulers you know there I'm not saying that there's been lack of planning or preparedness or resources we've all done what we we think is appropriate what's within our bounds but we shouldn't misrepresent any lack in infrastructure now as a crisis nor should it be used as leverage in time of one in terms of how you approach flexibility on waivers and recycling markets that's driven not by the coronavirus but by markets in general and I think with all due respect to the agency this proposal that they put forward has really been a huge distraction and there's been so many different things that have been intermingled in this conversation that seriously thinking about taking your time to consider how you might do waivers and how might do how you might do exercise of flexibility because it's not an immediate crisis as some would like is to think as it would be because of act or because of COVID-19 so thank you very much I'll leave it up that and I will try and answer any questions should you have any great are there any questions from the committee I don't see any at the moment I do have some so one thank you again you did send you emailed the committee some information I think it was yesterday or the day before the facts and figures and I did go through it but I'm just not remembering what was in and what was out of the facts and figures you were sharing today are they included in the mailing the email that you already sent to folks or is there anything today I'll be happy to submit what I said today just so you have the complete record I'm not sure there's a little overlap but not complete right I know you had a cover letter and so yeah if you and I also provided guidance that was from BOSHA or I'm sorry from NRA and OSHA and SWANA and I believe you also already have a letter from John Letty from the Vermont Celebrate Managers Association I'm happy to resubmit that as well right well in particular I was thinking you had talked about how many schools how many you know technical assistance composting workshops etc it's helpful because one of the concerns that has come up in broader discussions outside this committee in the Senate is to what degree are we prepared for July 1st you know has there been enough publicity is there been enough sort of field level outreach and education so that people will make the the transition over and so that would say the pump is well primed right now okay we are we are deluged with calls every single day about this and yeah those those considerable efforts on both behalf of the private and public sector I think would would seriously be set back if you may change this to the deadline right now okay I know that here in Addison County I see posts somewhat regularly from Addison County solid waste about composting equipment workshops etc are you are you doing the same thing uh leading that kind of stuff in Lemoyle County and using social media or from porch forum newspapers how are you folks doing your outreach yeah absolutely we use all forms of social media and prior to COVID a lot of face-to-face conversations with businesses with schools with institutions um we recently um have um had a forum in Stowe on request of Representative Heidi Sherman to help businesses learn about and prepare for the the July 1 deadline that had to be cancelled live and we're going to be doing it again next month we also have what we call compost literacy program that we're doing online right now where we have speakers authors and through the library system helping people understand the merits of composting the pros and cons the transportation and different methods of composting how it could be done and we're doing that as we are now through zoom through the library system okay one thing that you mentioned I'd just like to double back to we've reached out at various points and heard from um Department of Health sometimes directly sometimes through A&R who's been working with them um can you just reiterate what you were saying about Department of Health if you had direct communications with them or are you counting on the Governor's Office because Dr. Levine's part of the daily ongoing work so that if you should have heard something you already will have I just want to be explicit about health related connections here yeah I don't have any um personal connections with the health department we have not had um one-on-one conversations with them um obviously whatever social media that they're using we follow we follow everything that's being done with Dr. Levine and we use their guidances as well they do have broad authority to affect businesses and and look at industries and evaluate whether or not those activities should be occurring and they have not as far as I know to this point made any comments about suspending or changing up on solid waste practices okay great um well thank you for your patience uh my pleasure a long lead into to speaking but um we're coming up on noon and I just want to double check um so if I don't I don't see any other questions from members of committee um and with that I just want to thank you for your participation and thanks very helpful thank you very much um Jude can you make sure that um Ms. Alexander's handouts get posted and then if you could just email them to committee members as well that would be very helpful and with that if uh any other committee business that people want to bring up before we wrap up in a journey for the day okay so we will plan to be back next Tuesday um I need to double check with leadership on how long floor may run uh because it's a lot easier in when we're in the building to just say we will meet after the floor um because the zoom we have to schedule times etc and people outside the building end up waiting so we'll work on what our schedule is for Tuesday but in general we'll plan to meet for the foreseeable future Tuesday through Friday to work on a variety of bills um so thank you very much thank you and have a great day bye bye