Chapter 5
Neighborhoods Call for Fair Share
Local Law 40 of 1990
In 1990, New York City created Local Law 40, a "Fair Share" rule calling for consideration of the local impact of waste management facilities. It required DOS to create siting guidelines that would ensure the burdens of waste transfer stations were distributed equally (and therefore, efficiently) among every district of the city. Community activists from neighborhoods with large concentrations of waste transfer stations had scored a major victory.
The Giuliani administration fought Local Law 40 in court, ultimately losing at each level. Last summer, DOS finally drafted siting regulations. They are predictably toothless and riddled with exemptions, practically grandfathering existing transfer stations. Recently departed Sanitation Commissioner John Doherty said at the time that he is unable to place limits on concentrations of transfer stations. He claimed he was handcuffed by the city's zoning ordinances.
The latest developments at City Planning offer no hope in this regard. The department is currently engaged in rezoning parts of the city's 581 miles of waterfront. Their new proposals improve the way residential and natural waterfront areas are regulated, but fail to correct the industrial zones that are actually mixed-use areas. Heavy industrial zones will continue to be confined to a few low-income areas of the city. The rezoning proposal includes no performance standards for such areas, either, and will effectively lock-in the existing problems of waste transfer stations for the near future.
Chapter 6 -- Fresh Kills to Close at Last:
SICCA Wins, Sort Of
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