California Assembly Bill AB 1826 (signed into law on September 28, 2014) stipulates that local governments are to facilitate compliance with this law by establishing and implementing additional recycling programs. The purpose of this regulation is to separate commercial organic waste from the waste stream and divert it from landfills.
AB1826 recycling requirements are intended to be phased in over several years and will help the state meet its goal to recycle 75% of its waste by 2020. Specifically for organic waste, AB 1826 requires businesses and multi-family dwelling units of five units or more meeting the following criteria to arrange for recycling services:
- Tier 1: On or after April 1, 2016, a business that generates 8 cubic yards or more of organic waste per week
- Tier 2: On or after January 1, 2017, a business that generates 4 cubic yards or more of organic waste per week
- Tier 3: On or after January 1, 2019, a business that generates 4 cubic yards or more of commercial solid waste per week
As noted above, we are now in Tier 3. Republic previously provided a list of all of the accounts that generate more than 4 cubic yards of trash per week in Brea. There are a total of 638 accounts out a total of approximately 1,045 commercial accounts that fall under this category. All businesses from Tiers 1 and 2 are part of this list as well. Please note that the actual number of businesses will be lower than the number of accounts since some businesses have multiple accounts. See Attachment 1 for full list.
Since early 2016, the City of Brea has been working diligently to adopt and implement the program. There have been numerous meetings with City Council to discuss this topic. The most recent City Council discussions came at a Public Hearing on April 16, 2019 and at a follow-up discussion on July 16, 2019. On July 16, 2019, City Council directed staff to bring back a discussion on the two primary pricing options, Single User “Generator” or “Sector Wide”
For context, the following is a brief summary of both including the most recent pricing per Republic:
- Single User “Generator” Pricing Option:
Full program costs are covered by organic waste generators that subscribe to this program. Cost includes container, collection, disposal, processing, monitoring and City franchise fee. Since there are no general fees collected for Organics, Republic will charge a business $200 for a site visit to assess their container needs. If the business signs up for a 2 cubic yard organic container service, the fee will be waived. Attachment 2 shows the proposed fees for this option along with a breakdown for the costs.
- Sector-Wide Pricing Option:
Increase of refuse rates of 3.06% to be spread across the entire business sector. Cost includes collection, disposal, processing, monitoring, outreach and annual education. The City franchise is not included based on prior City Council direction. Businesses that generate organics will also pay for any organic containers they may need based on the size and collection frequency. Attachment 3 shows the methodology used to determine the proposed rate increase. In addition, Attachment 4 shows the proposed container fees for this option.
The proposed rates for the Option 1 (Sector-Wide) was reviewed by HF&H. HF&H concluded that the rates are reasonable given the expected operational cost by Republic to provide the service. At the time of this writing, Republic had submitted revised rates for Option 2 (Generator Only) and had not been reviewed by HF&H.
As mentioned in a previous meeting, Option 1 participation is expected to be lower than Option 2. Hence, the cost to provide the service to a limited amount of customers results in higher individual costs. In contrast, higher participation is expected with Option 2 with comparatively lower costs. Attachment 5 shows the proposed container rates for both options side-by-side. Please recall that for either option, the cost of adding a new organics container is partially offset by the reduction in regular trash service by the proportional amount. There is more of a cost offset in Option 2. Either option meets the State obligation to have a fully implemented Organics program.
To illustration the impact to businesses based on the proposed fees for these two program options, staff worked with Republic to update the previous examples shared with City Council: Downtown, Embassy Suites and a Typical Small Business. See Attachments 6a-6c.
CalRecycle
As mentioned at the July 16, 2019 City Council meeting, CalRecycle recently issued a letter to the City of Brea giving the City a 60-Day Conferring Period for Potential Compliance Enforcement. During the conferring period, a full evaluation of the City's MORe program education, outreach, identification, monitoring, and if applicable enforcement efforts will be completed to assess whether the City has complied with the requirements of the law. Should CalRecycle find that the City has not fully implemented the law, CalRecycle will begin the process of considering whether issuance of a compliance order would be appropriate. Jurisdictions that fail to satisfy the conditions of a compliance order could be subject to a fine of up to $10,000 per day. See Attachment 7. |