According to DPW chief Ned Huntley the landfill operation generated most recently about $3.2 million in revenues and its solid waste enterprise fund contributes $468 thousand per year to the city’s general budget through a host community fee. The $468 thousand does not appear to be indexed to the rate of inflation which means its real value diminishes each year. Another $326 thousand is allocated for direct and indirect costs, as well as to employee benefits. These expenditures include payments to the mayor’s office, the city council, legal services, MIS, medical and life insurance, unemployment compensation, the office of planning and development, and a payment in lieu of taxes. $92 thousand goes to the DPW itself for engineering and administration. The total FY 08 financial benefit to Northampton residents on a per capita basis is just under $28.
The largest commercial hauler that uses the regional landfill is Hatfield based Duseau Trucking, accounting for about 25% of landfill dumping fees. According to DPW records, in 1969 Armand “Buddy” Duseau was a principal partner in Calduwood Enterprises, a company that successfully lobbied the city to site the landfill on Glendale Road, despite expressed reservations from then Mayor Wallace J. Puchalski and Edson F. White, an engineer for Utility Survey Engineering Corp. of Reading, Mass. Mr. White cautioned against placing a landfill near potential water resources. At that time Calduwood secured the services of Almer Huntley, Jr. & Associates, a Northampton based land survey and engineering firm owned by Ned Huntley’s father. Huntley & Associates provided engineering services that ultimately supported Calduwood’s initiative.
Almost forty years later Huntley and Duseau entities continue to influence Northampton public works operations. According to the DPW Contract List, Huntley & Associates was awarded contracts with the DPW totaling about $80 thousand from 1999 to 2006, the same year Mr. Huntley took over as chief of the DPW. Duseau Trucking also was awarded contracts with the city, for trash removal services dating to 2004 totaling about $30 thousand.
Today Duseau Trucking receives volume discounting as do other large carriers, like Alternative Recycling Systems, Allied Waste Services, Waste Management, Inc., and Solid Waste Solutions. On a monthly basis, if a commercial hauler exceeds $25 thousand in fees for depositing municipal solid waste at the regional landfill, it earns a discount of $5 per ton; at $50 thousand the discount increases to $7.50 per ton, and at $75 thousand the discount steps up to $10 per ton. The going rate is currently $70 per ton, so the first discount kicks in at 357 tons, the second at 714 tons, and the third at 1,071 tons.
According to a DPW Material Analysis Report, in Fiscal Year 2007 Duseau Trucking deposited 9,559 tons of municipal solid waste and a total of 10,775 tons of refuse into the landfill. The total includes construction and demolition debris as well as ash and leaf materials. Its total number of tickets was 2,155 therefore there were that many vehicle trips to Glendale Road and a like number of trips from Glendale Road. FY 07 dumping fees for Duseau Trucking totaled $687.6 thousand, which included about $51 thousand in tier discounts and $16.8 thousand in school waste discounts. In Fiscal Year 2008 which ended June 30 of this year, Duseau Trucking deposited an average of about 903 tons per month in the landfill for an average of $63 thousand in monthly fees which included about $6 thousand per month in abatements. Of the DPW’s $3.06 million in commercial tipping fees for FY 08, Duseau Trucking accounted for $758.3 thousand, or 24.8% of the total. From FY 07 to FY 08 Duseau Trucking increased its business at the landfill by about ten percent.
Since January 2000 as a public service Duseau Trucking has offered free municipal solid waste services for Northampton’s public schools, providing containers for solid waste as well as for paper and container recycling and composting. Buddy Duseau said in a telephone interview that the cost to service a commercial client of the same size would be about $70 thousand annually, meaning that the city realizes a savings of about $53 thousand per year which translates into about a $450 thousand savings since 2000 at that rate. This is difficult to confirm though as the last available DPW records indicate that in Calendar Year 2000 the bill for Duseau Trucking services for the schools totaled about $43.8 thousand. The DPW stopped tracking the public schools’ trash costs when Duseau began its free services in 2000 so estimates of savings cannot be accurately quantified. Duseau Trucking also provides free services to Northampton’s churches. For the city of Easthampton and the town of Hatfield Duseau Trucking provides similar services but includes the waste from municipal buildings, like the town halls and fire departments, receiving no credits from the DPW.
It is complicated to ascertain exactly how many towns utilize the Glendale Road facility at a given point in time. Some towns have individual memorandums of understanding with the DPW directly; other area residents and organizations have their waste delivered through commercial haulers. As well, the number of users fluctuates annually. According to a DPW Community Tonnage Summary Report for 2007, sixteen communities brought solid municipal waste to the landfill comprising 11% of the total tons disposed of. In 2003 thirty communities utilized the landfill comprising 20% of the total tons disposed of. A 2005 DPW report compiled from waste hauler surveys indicated that 44 communities deposited their refuse at the landfill through commercial haulers. A DPW PowerPoint presentation on its website indicates that, “39 communities have contracts to use the landfill and of these 16 towns send all resident waste to the landfill.” As of July 8 there are a total of 261 permitted commercial users of the landfill, which includes the aforementioned commercial haulers, smaller businesses, nonprofit institutions, towns and exempt city agencies like the Northampton Housing Authority. The Housing Authority deposited 48.5 tons of waste in the landfill in FY 08 free of charge and its recycling rate was not included on the DPW reports shown to me.
Some questions linger: are the potential health and environmental costs associated with landfill expansion more than offset by its projected fiscal benefits? Are there other costs and benefits and if so, what are they? Northampton mayor Mary Clare Higgins, who is a proponent of the expansion proposal, has stated publicly that in her view the expansion is not about economics, but rather it is about regional waste management, that it is better to consolidate and truck trash into one location than for individual communities to operate their own landfills. Maybe so, but with recycling rates hovering below 50% in general and volume discounting in place at the regional landfill, there does not appear to be adequate incentives in place that would induce reductions in the waste flow that is piling up garbage in Northampton’s western region. It is an unfortunate situation that Northampton citizens find themselves placed in, where they are backed into a crisis situation where the options are few and time is fleeting.
