By Sharon Kvisto
From www.SanJuanIslander.com
San Juan County Council, on the advice of Prosecuting Attorney Randy Gaylord, is dropping flow control of municipal solid waste. Without this ordinance, it is difficult to imagine island companies on Orcas or San Juan islands successfully competing with Cimmaron Enterprises to operate the local transfer stations.
With flow control the county tells the msw collector – in this case San Juan Sanitation – which transfer station to use.
Asked if other counties and municipalities have flow control, county Solid Waste Planner Elizabeth Anderson said, “It is more common than not. The operators need it to plan on volume.”
San Juan Sanitation has told the selection committee it will work with Cimmaron Enterprises but not with Orcas Recycling Services Inc./The Exchange, the other bidder. …
To read the full editorial, go to: sanjuanislander.com/island-newshome/more/editorial/4945-is-the-county-setting-local-bidders-up-to-fail
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Thank you for posting this editorial. Flow control is used in many counties such as ours. Islands have special needs and our county would likely be allowed to keep flow control, especially if we want to recycle food waste, green waste, and other organics. If we lose flow control, we can kiss local control good bye. I encourage people to ask Council to keep flow control.Without it, San Juan Sanitation will take its garbage to the mainland and circumvent using Orcas Transfer Station if Orcas Recycling Services gets the contract. Flow control is a checks and balances system to assure non-discrimination.
Will someone explain what flow control is? not clear from the article.
“Flow control” is, basically, an ordinance that requires that all solid waste “disposed of” in the county be delivered to a County transfer station. The intent was to help assure revenue to cover SJCSWDD operations and capital investment.
Now, however, the stations won’t be operated by County, and any investments aren’t County investments. Maintaining flow control when the sites are leased out to private operators would mean that everybody, individuals and San Juan Sanitation, would be required to deliver their solid waste to a private operator–a government mandate to use a particular private vendor, at whatever price that vendor decides to charge.
Absent flow control San Juan Sanitation (and anybody else) will be free to take the garbage it collects to the most cost effective licensed facility, passing the savings on to its customers. That’s what the Town of Friday Harbor does now, saving folks a substantial amount of money.
A local operator could match that price,…
(the rest of the post)
A local operator could match that price, and assuming they’re operationally compatible, WUTC rules would require SJS to use them. As I understand it, that’s what Cimarron has offered to do. ORS could do the same.
Flow control doesn’t favor one potential operator over another. It favors operators over customers.
Flow control was defined in the August 1 Orcas Issues’ post https://theorcasonian.com/public-works-director-talks-of-waste-resources, as “the County’s legal ability to prohibit any on-island solid waste from going off-island (flow control).
[County Council Chair and Solid Waste Subcommittee Chair Patty Miller] explained, “Flow control is designed for small counties to be able to build infrastructure and protects publicly-owned and operated sites. But the County has to public own AND operate a site for flow control to be in effect,” she said.
Since then, at https://theorcasonian.com/guest-editorial-county-flow-control-policy-challenged, the San Juan Islander editorialized on August 15, “With flow control the county tells the [municipal solid waste] msw collector – in this case San Juan Sanitation – which transfer station to use.”
YES, thank you, Margie for clarifying that! I was afraid Mr. Rosenberg’s comments might mislead the public, since things are not that simplistic.
When private solid waste handlers gain a monopoly and threaten to remove the solid waste they handle to the mainland, because they only want to work with a certain party who offers the lowest rates – well, with flow control, that discussion would not even be allowed to happen; nor should it! The hidden costs of moving our recyclable solid waste off-island has great cost to this county. It’s about more than money. It’s about keeping things locally managed.