Garbage surcharge put on hold

By Joe Schoenmann

Thursday, Nov. 6, 2008 | 2 a.m.

Clark County commissioners won’t be voting anytime soon on Republic Services’ request to add a surcharge to garbage bills to help pay for the cleanup of Sunrise Landfill.

The commission decided Wednesday to postpone the request “indefinitely,” so the agenda item can’t come back before the commission unless four commissioners vote to reconsider it.

Because the move left open a window, however small, for the surcharge, it might have staved off a lawsuit by Republic. Right after the meeting, Bob Coyle, Republic Services area president, said only that the company was considering its options.

Part of Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani’s argument for the postponement was that two of seven commissioners — Republicans Bruce Woodbury and Chip Maxfield — are lame ducks whose replacements were chosen by voters Tuesday.

The postponement passed

6-0 with Commission Chairman Rory Reid abstaining.

The two incoming commissioners — Democrats Steve Sisolak and Larry Brown — will take office in January. Sisolak is on record as against the surcharge, and Brown has been noncommittal.

Giunchigliani has been the commission’s staunchest opponent of the surcharge, arguing that Republic agreed to take care of the landfill on its own in exchange for a long and lucrative extension to its garbage collection contract.

At Wednesday’s meeting she chastised Republic for trying to increase its charges to county residents while the company has a merger pending that reportedly would result in corporate bonuses of almost $200 million.

“I don’t think they need our customers to have to pay them anything,” she said. “I can’t believe they’re doing golden parachutes in this day and age.”

Commissioner Tom Collins countered that pay for Republic executives is not relevant. “Some contractors make millions, and we don’t use that to base any of our decisions,” Collins said.

Collins said his bigger concern is that he doesn’t know how much of the $30 million cost that Republic wants to pass on to ratepayers is directly due to Environmental Protection Agency requirements or “how much was legitimate.”

Maxfield, a civil engineer who has disagreed with the county attorney’s opinion that the cost of the landfill cleanup is entirely Republic’s problem, said the issue for him is the documentation.

“If it was plain black and white, it would say, ‘Here’s the dollars, have a nice day, see you later,’ ” he said. “But I’ve read the contract and agreements, the memos, and there are parts of it that are not clear.”

Republic Services was doing the work, he said, “then in the middle of that process, (the scope of work) was changed.”

“I can’t fault Republic and I can’t fault the county,” he added. “But the reality is, there have to be certain things done.”

Woodbury, a lawyer, said the matter seemed simple enough: “The project got a lot more expensive in terms of EPA requirements added on and added on. And as is sometimes the case, those expenses may have been necessary.”

Nine years ago Republic Services agreed to complete EPA-demanded fixes to Sunrise Landfill, three miles east of Las Vegas, in return for a 15-year contract extension, worth an estimated $220 million.

The landfill had been closed since 1993, and the EPA had ordered action after a September 1998 rainfall, which meteorologists said was a 1-in-100-year event, broke through the landfill’s cap. Some of its 25 million tons of garbage flowed into the Las Vegas Wash, which feeds into Lake Mead, the main source of Las Vegas’ drinking water.

So Republic Services developed a plan and estimated the cost at $36 million cost to remediate and install monitoring wells. Coyle complained to the Sun last week that EPA requirements kept growing and the price for the work wound up being nearly double Republic’s estimate.

The monitoring wells have been sunk, but all of the “fixing” of the landfill remains to be done, Coyle said.

In August, Republic Services agreed to pay a $1 million civil fine to resolve alleged violations of the Clean Water Act. As part of that agreement, Republic committed to installation of extensive storm water controls, an armored engineered cover, methane gas collection, ground water monitoring and long-term maintenance. The EPA estimated the work would take two years.

Republic wants the county to approve an additional charge on its garbage bills to raise $30 million to cover costs at the landfill. Two months ago the commission ordered county staff to come up with various proposals to pay for 30 percent or 50 percent of the $30 million.

The possibilities are that residential customers would pay $1.68 more or $3.36 more per year; annual commercial rates would increase $33.24 or $66.60; and industrial customer rates would increase $10.84 or $21.72 per year.

Those additional charges would be in place anywhere from 3 1/4 years to 11 1/2 years, depending upon the combination of rates and percent payments chosen.

But it’s all in limbo now.