When Mayor Jack Martins first took office, he conducted a review of the Village's costs for the disposal of solid waste. "I thought that the numbers looked a bit high for a village of our size," he said. "I wanted to look at tonnage and rates."

Mineola is party to a contract with the Town of North Hempstead and the Town of North Hempstead Solid Waste Management Authority, signed in 1996 and due to expire in 2011, according to which the Town's facility accepts all of Mineola's solid waste at a certain cost per ton. This cost is often referred to as a "tipping fee".

Mayor Martins' investigation revealed that during many years prior to his inquiry there were certain deliveries of waste regularly charged to the Village which were not from Mineola's garbage trucks but from a private carter. "We looked at our weight slips, truck identification numbers and receipt signatures and we found that we were being charged for garbage which wasn't ours," said the mayor.

This matter was originally presented to the Town and to the private carter, but no agreement could be reached to correct the overpayment. "That's when I instructed the Village Attorney to bring a lawsuit," said the mayor. "There was no way that they were not going to pay us back."

The lawsuit went through the discovery phase and the Village Attorney's office put together the documentary evidence to show that private carting tipping fees were being assessed to the Village. "We caught them red-handed and to make matters worse, neither the Town nor the carting company wanted to take responsibility for the charges and overpayment," said Martins. "We were left with no option but to bring the lawsuit and were fully prepared to go to trial, if necessary."

The private carter and the Town agreed to settle the case just before a trial was scheduled. According to the settlement, the carter agreed to pay the sum of $345,000 to the Village as compensation for the tipping fees improperly assessed against Mineola. The settlement check has been delivered.

"I am happy to announce that we have received a return of overpaid tipping fees and that an unfortunate practice which had been going on for years has ended," said Martins. "Not only did we stop the hemorrhaging of our tax dollars and received a great settlement, we have also put procedures in place to prevent this from ever happening again - a win-win-win for the Mineola taxpayer."