Once again the Town of North Hempstead is embroiled in a battle over the flow control of garbage.

Fifteen years ago this same topic surfaced and in the end, after many meetings and many legal battles, two of the villages, Village of New Hyde Park and Village of Westbury opted out and chose not to send their garbage to the town's transfer station in Port Washington citing the exorbitant prices for tip fees that the town charges.

At the outset of the hearing North Hempstead Town Supervisor Jon Kaiman introduced the topic by saying, "The Town of North Hempstead has historically been recognized as the Solid Waste Management Authority (SWMA) designated entity from the State of New York for this region covering the entire town of North Hempstead. We still carry that designation but it has changed over the years.

"Fifteen years ago Flow Control was the law of the land. All the villages and all the unincorporated areas within our larger community had all their waste disposed of in the municipal dumps that are based near the transfer station. Before that, there were other locations in the town where there were dumps as well. All those dumps have been closed and they all carried costs even to this day.

"The Supreme Court, 15 years ago, ruled that Flow Control cannot be allowed anymore and just last year, in 2007, the Supreme Court reversed that decision, basically indicating there is a compelling reason for municipalities to control the flow of solid waste within its community.

"The Town of North Hempstead has researched the issue that is called Flow Control. We have looked at the history and we believe that the basis of Flow Control is local control at a level that allows a municipality the size of North Hempstead to use our efficiencies to provide the removal of waste at the cheapest cost. We believe that Flow Control would reduce costs but would allow us to ensure that recyclables, which is the priority of this administration and government, and most of the communities as well, will be monitored and enforced in ways we are unable to do today. The environmental issues and the flow of the trucks will be taken into account and so there will be an environmental benefit as well. All the residents in the town will be able to see cost savings and efficiencies that will not necessarily be achieved if we did not pursue this course of action.

"Over the last couple years the Town of North Hempstead has engaged in meetings. We invited all the mayors to a meeting at Harbor Links where we discussed this issue. We invited all of the carters in the area to a meeting and all of the school districts in the areas to explain how flow control will impact the schools.

"We met with the Village Officials Association and created a Solid Waste Committee and seven mayors, led by Mayor Marvin Natiss. We called a second meeting after the hearing process started.

"The mayors indicated they were concerned as to whether or not there would be efficiencies and whether or not they would lose control over their solid waste flow and whether or not it would create additional costs. I understand there are some in the industry that are for this, and some that are against. In my mind the ability of one entity to monitor and control the flow of solid waste makes sense to make sure that everyone is playing by the rules and that everyone is being treated equitably and that recyclables are getting recycled and everyone is paying as little as possible in light of the scale that exists when everyone operates together."

Mayor of North Hills Marvin Natiss then came to the mike. He said, "As chairperson of the committee, I am speaking on behalf of the VOA. The VOA became involved in February when you invited us to Harbor Links to review the Request for Proposal (RFP). I thought that, as committee chairperson I was accomplishing something, but it appears I have accomplished zero because at this point if you are intending to vote on this proposed law and I was fortunate to have a copy forwarded to me. Throughout the law, I do not see any opportunity for any village to 'opt' out.

One of the major issues that we had in our prior discussions when we indicated to you that we would like to work together with the Town of North Hempstead, after all we are 31 villages in the town of the 64 villages in Nassau County. So we do represent a substantial interest in terms of numbers of people and mayors and trustees.

"We feel there should be an opt out for the villages. So, if we can do it for less, we should be allowed to do so."

Mayor Samansky said he was also the president of the Great Neck Village Officials Association, past president of the Nassau County VOA and a member of the SWMA Committee presently established.

He said, "I was also the chairman, 15 years ago, that negotiated the agreement with the town and we are in our 13th year. It is a pleasure for me to address equal partners in municipal government and I would remind the council that 28 of the 31 villages are signed into this 15-year agreement.

"We did it because we negotiated. We have two more years to go. For you to say that certain villages are not paying their fair share is a false argument. Fifteen years ago we negotiated that very clause and the amount that we are paying is part of the total agreement which included the right of villages to opt out. The proposed law has many exceptions and I understand where you are coming from, but I think you should add an exception for villages. But, let us sit down the way we started to negotiate a renewal of this agreement. Flow Control strikes at the heart of home rule. Mr. Spitzer has gone and takeover fever and steamrolling are over. I must tell you the Nassau County VOA Committee and the town negotiations were ongoing and where Flow Control came from I have no idea. Unless, you are breaking that commitment to negotiate with the villages."

James McCloat, the superintendent of Public Works for the Village of New Hyde Park was the next up to the microphone. He said, "We went through this before. I was very much involved 15 years ago. I was the superintendent then and I actually represented my village in most of the discussions. We were one of the mavericks or that is what we were considered because we chose to do our own fighting for our taxpayers. We have been successful in protecting our residents ever since paying tipping fees in the $60 per ton range while at the same time the Town of North Hempstead was $104 a ton going to $150. We are still paying way below what you charge.

"The Town of North Hempstead, as we see it, will be nothing more than a garbage brokering. The town really doesn't perform any services for the village except to tell the villages how, when and why we can dump our garbage. They know no other function, but to raise the rates. Back in 1989, when this all started, the rates were $54 a ton. Three years later in 1992 the rate was $104 and that's what triggered us to get out and go on our own."

"You can't just put the burden on the villages. If the villages have to raise taxes due to solid waste disposal, then we absolutely should have the right to negotiate and get the best deal for our residents. We are obligated to do that very thing in every other walk of life. So, I urge the town board not to make the same mistake twice. This would be strike two."

The next speaker was a resident of Roslyn. She said she lives about a block from West Shore Road. She said that they have garbage trucks that continuously come up and down Old Northern Boulevard "spewing garbage" and oozing stuff that smells quite bad. She said, "This is what we live with now before you are going to add any additional garbage. We also have a problem with garbage trucks coming up Mott Avenue and that's not supposed to happen. Some of the residents have called the garbage companies directly and asked them not to do this. It lasts a couple of weeks and then they are right back to the same thing. On garbage days you cannot go out of your house because the stench is that bad. I'm not concerned about the money, the mayors, but what I am concerned with is the quality of my life and the lives of those who live in this area in Roslyn."

Mayor Petruccio said, "This is an issue of choice and home rule. In 1992 we opted out of this arrangement and went on the spot market. By my calculations, with just this year's 6,000 tons of garbage, at a $10 a ton savings, and that's a low figure, we saved over that period of time a million dollars for our residents.

"Now let me speak to another issue. Part of our village is in the Town of Hempstead, so I don't want to separate my routes to accommodate this issue.

"Fundamentally, I have a different position than the other mayors. I don't want to sit at the table, I don't want to negotiate, I don't' want to talk about it. Basically, I will tell you that if you stick with this we will sue. As a mayor, and I'm not a political person, but I will make sure that anyone that votes for this will be in a position not to receive votes from my district. Of course, my representative is Angelo Ferrara (who was not present at the meeting due to illness in his family) and he will be running on an open seat. It's pretty simple for us because we don't have a lot of leverage. You talk about sitting at the table and that assumes that partnership is based on equal money and something that we are both doing of equal proportion. This is more like a 95-5 partnership. That doesn't work. I know what your problem is. You have a problem with budgets whether it is in the general fund or the fund for the SWMA. It is very easy to look to the revenue, but look back at your expenses and figure out another way, because the system has been working for the last 14 years. You have heard that from all the mayors and I'm sure you will hear it from every mayor that will get up after me. It works for every individual village. We haven't complained, so the question is, 'why now.' I know the answer. Half in our village being in the Town of Hempstead is an insurmountable problem and again, I don't want to negotiate, I'm looking to talk to you about it. As a matter of fact, check that window out there. There is a garbage truck from New Hyde Park there and if we have anything to say about it that will be the last garbage truck, from New Hyde Park, you will ever see north of the Long Island Expressway. It's pretty simple, It's the only way I can position it from our village's point of view, Right now, the board that I represent, and the board members are presently here with me, and we presently make that decision for our residents and we have done a good job because our budgets have come in the last two years at 2 percent and zero percent increases. So, our residents are being well served."

"So, the question is who gets to decide where we dump our garbage. The mayor and the trustees of the Village of New Hyde Park or this board. We are very comfortable making that decision for our residents. We have to tell you that if you pass this tonight we will definitely take legal action and we are not happy with this."

The major concern of attorney Lawrence Boes, in objecting to the new flow control rules is the fact that Westbury will have to travel at least 16 miles of wasted transportation and transfer station costs to a facility in Port Washington that he described as a "Rube Goldberg" apparatus.

He said, "This was cobbled together in 1991 following the state-mandated Long Island Landfill Law, which closed the North Hempstead landfills east of West Shore Road and the abandonment of plans for a resource recovery facility within the town. The nature and location of this transfer station is totally unsatisfactory for a number of reasons principally because it is inefficiently located on the only site available to the town in the early '90s. It is an open air facility located in or near wetlands at the foot of Hempstead Harbor, close to a condo development and between the Village of Flower Hill and Roslyn south of Bar Beach-North Hempstead Park."

Boes concluded, "This law is designed to increase tonnage processed in the town's transfer station, increase tip fees based on monopoly rates for the town's SWMA, increase contributions to the town's own general funds by allocation of additional administration, legal and accounting and enforcement costs and increased payroll for SWMA. The town pretends there is some environmental benefit gained through its administration of this solid-waste program, paradoxically by raising rates it hopes to pay for increased law-enforcement. But this program, like any private solid waste operator, which the town contracts with or which operates outside the town's management, is supervised environmentally by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. But the transfer station operated in the open air without any enclosure or usable doors is the worst offender. No private operator would ever be approved for the operation of a solid waste project in wetlands close to Hempstead Harbor and one mile south of public beaches. The town hopes to improve its enforcement of its solid waste program, but an economically sound program creates its own incentives."

Kaiman commented, "Are you volunteering your village for a transfer station? The primary goal of this practice is to stop the fact that recyclables manage to end up in the general stream of garbage and we tend to end that practice and our ability to control flow would enable us to do that."

Mayor Strada said that his village has been through this before and it doesn't make sense to cart their garbage when they can dump for much cheaper practically across the street. He, too, urged for an opt out clause.

Kaiman, "We hope that we can come up with a resolution that makes sense for every resident in our community. We want people to pay as little as possible for the removal of the garbage.

"So, I am going to recommend that we put this issue over until the next board meeting on July 29, but we do need to move quickly and efficiently. I would ask Mayor Natiss to reconvene that committee and at the end of the day garbage is going to be what we will be discussing for the next 20 years, but the town's goal is not to impose something so that we can get extra revenue so that everyone is benefiting in the same way."

The board then voted to hold the discussion over until the next North Hempstead Town Board meeting to be held on July 29 at 7:30 p.m. at North Hempstead Town Hall, 200 Plandome Road, Manhasset.