Date: June 11, 2007
Source: Connecticut Attorney General's Office
Attorney General Calls On Governor, Legislative Leaders To Include Trash Hauling Bill In Special Session
Attorney General Richard Blumenthal today called on legislative leaders and the governor to include in the upcoming special session legislation to attack anti-competitive practices and organized crime influence in Connecticut's trash hauling industry -- measures that he has urged repeatedly over the past seven years, most recently this session.
State Senate President Pro Tempore Donald E. Williams, Jr., D-Brooklyn, joined Blumenthal in urging lawmakers to approve legislation to regulate state trash haulers during the special session.
Blumenthal's proposal requires background checks and state licenses for trash haulers, creates a commission to investigate alleged abuses and mob influence and outlaws certain anti-competitive contract provisions.
The General Assembly failed to act on such legislation during its regular session, which ended last week. Very similar measures were supported by Gov. M. Jodi Rell based on recommendations by her working group during the session.
"For seven years, I have repeatedly urged strong measures to stop consumer abuses and mob influence, and clean up Connecticut's carting industry," Blumenthal said. "The majority of honest trash haulers should welcome safeguards that other states long ago adopted. If these enforcement tools had been approved seven years ago when I first urged them, our state would have been spared substantial waste and abuse.
"These measures attack abuses that harm consumers and corrupt our system -- fighting illegal practices that raise trash hauling prices and enable mob infiltration. This legislation was good public policy before the session and is even better public policy now. Recent events have highlighted anti-competitive and organized crime influences in Connecticut's trash hauling industry, heightening the need for immediate action. Lawmakers should seize the opportunity in the upcoming special session to pass my longstanding proposals -- background checks and state licenses for trash haulers, regulatory oversight and prohibition of anti-competitive contract provisions," the attorney general added.
Under Blumenthal's proposal, a commission would be established to oversee and scrutinize the system and initiate enforcement action when appropriate. The commission would be comprised of representatives of the Department of Environmental Protection, the Attorney General's Office, the Department of Public Safety, the Chief State's Attorney's Office, and the Department of Consumer Protection.
Presently, licensing is already required for hazardous waste haulers and storage operators, transfer station operators, and landfill owners and operators. Solid waste and trash haulers would be added as licensees. DEP would issue the new licenses.
Under Blumenthal's proposal, solid waste contracts:
Cannot exceed two years.
Must give customers the right to terminate contracts during their automatic renewal period upon 30-days written notice.
Cannot require customers to notify their hauler of competing bids or otherwise limit their ability to hire a competitor.
Must provide customers with written notice of rate changes at least 30 days in advance and written notice of any subcontract or assignment of their pick up to another hauler at least 60 days in advance.
Cannot require customers terminating a contract before its term ends to pay damages that exceed the termination's actual cost to the hauler.
In 1993, Blumenthal sued Hartford area trash haulers for illegally carving the region into exclusive territories, recovering $1.1 million for 37 municipalities. In 1994. he sued Fairfield County haulers for anti-competitive practices, obtaining $790,000 in restitution.
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