WVEC Action Alert

March 3, 2007

PUBLIC HEARING Scheduled on SB 629 for:
Monday – March 5 – 4:00 p.m.
House Judiciary – Room 410 M

SB 629 (Increasing the McDowell County Land Fill to 100,000 tons per month)

Please attend this PUBLIC HEARING to speak out opposing SB 629 on Monday if you possibly can, and/or call and e-mail our legislators in the House.

Call / e-mail your Delegates, House Speaker Thompson, and Governor Manchin!  This bill is in House Judiciary and will be taken up in committee Monday immediately following the PUBLIC HEARING (where it then goes to House Finance.)  Our delegates are under a lot of pressure from special interests to move SB 629 through both the Judiciary Committee and House Finance, where it would then go to the House floor for a vote.

We need to stop this bad bill now! 

Let our House of Delegates members and Governor Manchin know you oppose SB 629 in favor of keeping our solid waste law as is – limiting the size of landfills in West Virginia and continuing to impose the current fee of $8.25 per ton (this fee helped in providing millions of dollars in local recycling grants to towns and counties – and the flow of out-of-state garbage has dramatically slowed.)

Talking Points:

  • McDowell County does not need this huge landfill – which would open the door to out of state garbage!  Local need is just not there to justify this change to current solid waste law.
  • SB 629 would radically change solid waste management policy in West Virginia – a law that has worked well for 15 years.
  • This bill calls for increasing the McDowell County landfill’s legal tonnage to 100,000 tons per month (WV’s largest landfill accepts 30,000 tons of trash per month.)
  • The bill also exempts half of this new tonnage from the current $8.25 tipping fee, allowing for a $4.00 per ton payment to various McDowell government agencies.  By doing this, it grants a $2.4 million dollar tax break per year to the landfill’s owner at the expense of the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the Solid Waste Authorities for 54 other counties.

Please help stop this legislation! 

Capitol toll free number:  1 877-565-3447  (local Charleston number:  1 (304) 347-4836)
Speaker Thompson:  1 (304) 340-3210
Governor Manchin’s office:  1 888-438-2731
Capitol website: http://www.legis.state.wv.us (you can view all legislator’s e-mail addresses and office numbers here).
Fax:  1 (304) 347-4901