Testimony — To Committee on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management in support of Int. no 55
ALIGN Testimony
Council Member Shaun Abreu, Chair
New York City Committee on Sanitation and Waste Management
My name is Jenille Scott, and I am the Climate Director of ALIGN: The Alliance for a Greater New York. We bring together labor, climate, and community for a more just and sustainable New York, and I am writing as one of the leading organizations of the Transform Don’t Trash Coalition fighting for a green economy and better conditions for our state’s workers. Thank you to Sanitation committee chair Council Member Shaun Abreu for the opportunity to submit
testimony today.
ALIGN strongly supports Intro 55 which requires the Department of Sanitation to accept commercial solid waste at city-owned or operated marine transfer (MTS) stations and city-owned or operated rail transfer stations. The use of marine transfer stations is a more environmentally sound practice than the use of long haul trucks and will reduce truck miles traveled and traffic which creates safer streets for pedestrians and reduces noise issues caused by the current truck based system. Additionally, it will reduce the emission of harmful pollutants which are released in already overburdened communities. This will undoubtedly improve the air quality of these communities and create healthier environments for workers. Marine transfer stations are operated by the New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY) so there are more stringent requirements for compliance with regulations and labor standards so there are less concerns than with privately owned facilities.
Intro 55 also creates an accountability measure for DSNY in the form of an annual report that should be submitted to the Mayor, Speaker and to be made publicly available online around the acceptance and processing of commercial waste at each transfer station. This further emphasizes the aforementioned point of more stringent compliance requirements for DSNY which will ensure proper functioning of the facilities and maintenance of cleaner and safer streets for workers and the surrounding communities. The timing of this bill is significant as progress, although delayed, is being made on the implementation of 20 Commercial Waste Zones (required by Local Law 199) later this year.
These commercial waste zones were developed with the intention of creating safer and healthier environments and Intro 55 helps to further the purpose of LL199 . Additionally the 2006 Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP) is nearing expiration and the new 20-year SWMP is due in 2026 so this is a prime opportunity to ensure we develop and implement the 2026 SWMP the right way. We urge this committee and council to support the passage of Intro. 55 and bring overdo reform to the solid waste management system in New York.
Thank You
Jenille Scott
Climate Director
NYC-EJA Testimony
Testimony on the City’s Infrastructure to Handle and Process Organic Waste Pursuant to
Int. No. 55- Committee on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management
New York City Council
February 27, 2024
Founded in 1991, the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance (NYC-EJA) is a non-profit, 501(c)3 citywide membership network linking grassroots organizations from low-income neighborhoods and communities of color in their struggle for environmental justice. NYC-EJA empowers its member organizations to advocate for improved environmental conditions and against inequitable environmental burdens by the coordination of campaigns designed to inform City and State policies. Through our efforts, member organizations coalesce around specific common issues that threaten the ability of low-income communities of color to thrive. NYC-EJA
is led by the community-based organizations that it serves. NYC-EJA is also a founding member of Transform Don’t Trash (TDT), a longstanding coalition of environmental justice, labor, and climate organizations working to transform New York City’s sprawling solid waste management systems to be far more equitable, efficient, sustainable, and safe for workers and the communities most affected by solid waste infrastructure.
In New York City, over 24,000 tons of garbage are produced daily, generating massive transportation and pollution impacts to and from privately owned and operated waste transfer stations along the waterfront. The current solid waste system is an ongoing environmental injustice, in which 75% of the City’s waste is still trucked in and out of a handful of low-income communities and communities of color. The vast majority of this garbage generated by businesses and buildings citywide passes through communities with some of the highest rates of asthma such as North Brooklyn, the South Bronx, and Southeast Queens. Despite laws intended to change this, these communities of color continue to deal with far more than their fair share of heavy truck traffic, safety hazards, pollution, noise, and odor that other neighborhoods are spared. For this reason, NYC-EJA is here to express our strong support of Intro 055 of 2024, which would require DSNY to begin using municipal marine transfer stations to accept commercial waste. Passage of this legislation would hasten the long overdue transition of NYC’s waste export system from a polluting truck-based one to a water barge-based system, where one barge can replace the capacity of 48 eighteen wheel tractor trailer “long haul” trucks fromspewing pollutants into these communities.
While the total amount of waste handled at private transfer stations in NYC has decreased approximately 17% since the implementation of Local Law 152 of 2018 (the “Waste Equity Law”), newly released data from the Department of Sanitation shows that the system remains grossly unfair and unequal. Just four community districts still handle 75% of all NYC’s private waste. Additionally, private waste transfer stations are more likely to be sited in communities with a higher percentage of people of color living below the poverty line and bring with them truck traffic, noise, and health-harming emissions according to NYC Comptroller’s recently released audit report on the City’s Fair Share compliance. While there are 24 waste facilities crammed into these overburdened community districts, a total of 45 other districts have no
waste facilities at all.
Reducing emissions and pollutants from trash removal operations is necessary for the climate and health of all New Yorkers. City government can lead the way in spearheading environmental protection, by going deeper than providing surface-level programmatic design without thorough implementation efforts. Mayor Adams and the City Council should take immediate steps to relieve these communities of excessive truck traffic, pollution, and odors, while reducing the
miles that are driven by dangerous and polluting waste trucks e on New York City Streets. We call on the Mayor and City Council to Pass Intro 055 of 2024, which would require the City to begin accepting commercial waste at publicly-owned Marine Transfer Stations, thereby significantly reducing the number of dirty, dangerous diesel garbage trucks spewing co-pollutants into already overburdened neighborhoods. Environmental justice communities have long advocated for this step, which is required by the Solid Waste Management Plan passed by the City almost 20 years ago but has still not been implemented by DSNY. The fight for waste equity, cleaner air, healthier and safer communities continues as we work to ensure not only that the City handles its trash and siting of waste transfer stations more
equitably, but also reduces its greenhouse and co-pollutant emissions by transitioning to greener, alternative modes of solid waste management. NYC-EJA alongside TDT looks forward to continued engagement with the Committee on Sanitation, and Council Members representing impacted communities to ensure that we continue to make rapid progress toward a more sustainable and just future.
NYLPI Testimony
In Support of Intro 55 of 2024
Thank you Council Member Abreu and members of the Sanitation Committee, for the opportunity to submit testimony today.
New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI) strongly supports Intro 55 of 2024 requiring the Department of Sanitation (DSNY) to begin accepting commercial waste at the City’s marine and rail waste transfer facilities. This would enact a long-delayed environmental justice priority by reducing the number of trucks traveling in and out of communities overburdened by private, truck-based transfer stations. Currently, private sanitation trucks must travel unnecessary miles across boroughs and communities to reach private transfer stations where waste is then exported using large, highly polluting long-haul trucks.
The City’s nearly expired 2006 Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP) directed DSNY to report on efforts to process commercial waste at marine transfer stations and to issue an RFP to process commercial waste at least one Manhattan marine transfer station, but no further action has been announced.
The timeline required by Intro 55 is appropriate, as it would precede the new 20-year Solid Waste Management Plan due in 2026 and would coincide with the expected citywide implementation of the new Commercial Waste Zones (CWZ) system required by Local Law 199 of 2019.
The CWZ program was designed to sharply reduce commercial waste truck mileage citywide and incentivize the use of waste and recycling facilities with high safety and environmental standards, including publicly owned marine and rail-based transfer stations. In the absence of equitable and efficient options to utilize municipal facilities located near commercial districts and commercial waste routes, DSNY’s most recent Waste Equity report shows that almost 12,000 tons per day (75%) of the City’s commercial waste continues to be trucked in and out of a handful of overburdened communities in the South Bronx, North Brooklyn, and Southeast Queens.
Fundamental reforms to a notoriously inefficient, dangerous, and polluting commercial waste system are long overdue. Intro 55 would implement a common-sense solution first written into the City’s SWMP almost two decades ago. We urge this committee and the Council to pass it into law as soon as possible.
