The PA Waste Industries Association Wednesday said it was disappointed by a Monroe County judge’s refusal to block the Monroe County Municipal Waste Management Authority from imposing a county fee on private waste companies as a condition of contracting to dispose of waste generated in the county.

The Monroe County Court of Common Pleas ruled in favor of the authority without issuing an explanatory ruling. The fee system was included in a request for proposals issued by the authority earlier this year.

PWIA President Tim O’Donnell said, “We are disappointed by the decision. We continue to believe that the authority’s plan will result in Monroe County residents being burdened unnecessarily with higher costs for disposal of their trash and will damage the efficiency of waste disposal in a competitive marketplace.”

O’Donnell said PWIA will decide later whether or not to appeal the decision.

PWIA represents private-sector recyclers, waste haulers, and landfill operators throughout Pennsylvania and is the state chapter of the National Solid Wastes Management Association.

Under the authority’s request for proposals, waste companies will be required to sell disposal space at their facilities to the authority and give the authority the right to dictate the fee charged for that space.

PWIA argued in a hearing in early November that the plan was a roundabout way of imposing a “disguised” county administrative fee. Commonwealth Court ruled in 2005 that Act 101, passed by the legislature in 1988, preempts counties from imposing such fees.

O’Donnell said the legislature passed Act 101 to ensure a uniform system of solid waste management and recycling regulation statewide.

“If individual counties and municipal authorities are allowed to impose their own fees on the solid waste industry,” he said, “we will end up with an impossible crazy quilt of different rules, regulations, and fees all over Pennsylvania, undermining a fundamental purpose of Act 101 and placing higher costs on disposal customers.”

11/19/2012