MINUTES OF THE meeting

of the

ASSEMBLY Committee on Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Mining

 

Seventy-Second Session

March 31, 2003

 

 

The Committee on Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Miningwas called to order at 1:42 p.m., on Monday, March 31, 2003.  Chairman Tom Collins presided in Room 3161 of the Legislative Building, Carson City, Nevada.  Exhibit A is the Agenda.  Exhibit B is the Guest List.  All exhibits are available and on file at the Research Library of the Legislative Counsel Bureau.

 

Note:  These minutes are compiled in the modified verbatim style.  Bracketed material indicates language used to clarify and further describe testimony.  Actions of the Committee are presented in the traditional legislative style.

 

COMMITTEE MEMBERS PRESENT:

 

Mr. Tom Collins, Chairman

Mr. Jerry D. Claborn, Vice Chairman

Mr. Kelvin Atkinson

Mr. John C. Carpenter

Mr. Chad Christensen

Mr. Marcus Conklin

Mr. Jason Geddes

Mr. Pete Goicoechea

Mr. John Marvel

Mr. Bob McCleary

Mr. Harry Mortenson

Ms. Genie Ohrenschall

 

COMMITTEE MEMBERS ABSENT:

 

None

 

GUEST LEGISLATORS PRESENT:

 

Mrs. Sharron Angle, Assemblywoman, District No. 26

STAFF MEMBERS PRESENT:

 

Patrick Guinan, Research Analyst

Linda Eissmann, Senior Research Analyst

Erin Channell, Committee Secretary

 

OTHERS PRESENT:

 

Marvin Mattson, Private Citizen

Allen Biaggi, Administrator, Division of Environmental Protection, Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources

Joe Johnson, Legislative Advocate, Toiyabe Chapter, Sierra Club

Lou Gardella, Owner, Jiffy Smog; Co-Chairman, Nevada Emission Testers Council

Mike Prince, Representative, Terrible Herbst

Brian Keraly, Representative, Smog Busters, Las Vegas; Co-Chairman, Nevada Emission Testers Council

Andrew Goodrich, Division Director, Washoe County District Health Department, Air Quality Management Division

James Sohns, President, Nevada Car Owners Association; Member, Clark County Air Quality Committee

Dan Musgrove, Legislative Advocate, Clark County

Lloyd Nelson, Emission Control Manager, Management Services and Programs Division, Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles

Dave Emme, Chief, Bureau of Environmental Information and Planning, Division Environmental Protection, Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources; Former Chief, Bureau of Waste Management

Glenn Miller, Private Citizen

John Pappageorge, Legislative Advocate, Republic Services of Southern Nevada

Steve Kalish, President, Republic Services of Southern Nevada

Tom Green, Vice President, Reno Disposal Waste Management

Ray Bacon, Private Citizen

Jeanne Rucker, Washoe County District Health Department

Helen Foley, Legislative Advocate, Clark County Health District

Tracy Taylor, Division of Water Resources, Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources

 

Chairman Collins:

The meeting of Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Mining will come to order.  We’ll ask the secretary to call the roll.  [The Committee Secretary called roll.]  We’re all here.  I would like to start with taking care of some other business.  We have some subcommittees.  Have all four of those subcommittees met with the Chairman?  Starting in alphabetical order, we’ll start with Mr. Christensen.

 

Assembly Bill 287:  Revises provisions relating to transfer, establishment and maintenance of certain parks. (BDR 26-657)

 

Assemblyman Christensen:

The subcommittee on A.B. 287 met just before this meeting.  We approved this bill as is. 

 

Chairman Collins:

You are reporting it passed out of Subcommittee back to the full Committee?

 

Assemblyman Christensen:

Yes, that is correct.

 

Chairman Collins:

You passed it as is?

 

Assemblyman Christensen:

As is. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Mr. Carpenter’s bill has not had its Subcommittee meeting yet.  Who else?  Mr. Mortenson, on A.B. 131, did you take any action?

 

Assembly Bill 131:  Makes various changes relating to protection of cultural resources. (BDR 33-92)

 

Assemblyman Mortenson:

We took no action because of a press release, which is right in front of you (Exhibit C).  Could I read it to you? 

 

A bill before the State Legislature that would have created a stewardship program to help protect Nevada’s cultural resources has been withdrawn by its sponsor, Assemblyman Harry Mortenson.

 

Mortenson said that most of the people who testified at hearings on the bill supported its goals.  However, certain representatives of the mining industry objected to two words:  traditional and damage in A.B. 131.  Additional meetings were held to try to produce language that was acceptable to all parties but did not resolve the differences. 

 

“I want to make sure that Nevada’s cultural resources are preserved and protected for future generations,” Mortenson said. 

 

[Mr. Mortenson said he would skip through parts of the press release.]  

 

Mortenson said he had been working closely with Ron James, Administrator of the Office of Historic Preservation of the Department of Cultural Affairs, on ways to implement the program.

 

“I am confident that this stewardship program can be implemented to the satisfaction of all parties concerned.  I will ask our congressional delegation for assistance in obtaining federal funds and will also seek nonprofit sources.”

 

I guess that’s enough of it. 

 

Chairman Collins:

The Chair won’t recognize your withdrawal of the bill until you’ve considered limiting it to just Clark County, and then let me know on Wednesday.  [Mr. Mortenson asked for clarification.]  Limit it to Clark County or counties with 400,000 populations or more and then report back what that effect would be.  [Mr. Mortenson agreed.]

 

[Chairman Collins assigned Committee minutes for review to Assemblyman Atkinson, Assemblyman Christensen, Assemblyman Conklin, Assemblyman Geddes, Assemblyman Goicoechea, and Assemblyman McCleary.  Assemblyman Christensen returned the February 12 minutes he reviewed.] 

 

We have three bills before the Committee today.  We’ll start with our legislator, Assemblywoman Angle, with A.B. 416.  If you have any proponents or others you want to assist you, please bring them up. 

 

Assembly Bill 416:  Revises provisions governing emissions testing for certain motor vehicles. (BDR 40-863)

 

Assemblywoman Sharron Angle, District No. 26:

[Introduced herself.]  I have before you today A.B. 416, which is the vehicle emissions testing or the biennial smog check.  You have a packet (Exhibit D) so you can follow along.  I may be referring to some of the charts.

 

A.B. 416 is by request of District 26 constituents, and I have found that other constituencies in Washoe and Clark Counties are also eager to have this done.  What they want is to make smog checks biennial, rather than annual, and to exempt certain newer cars.  These are their reasons:

 

·        It’s expensive.  This could be up to $31.56 a year. 

·        It’s unnecessary and excessive.

·        Vehicles eight years old still do not reach the 1 percent level of failures on their smog checks. 

·        It’s inconvenient. 

·        All registering can be done electronically, but I have to get a smog check.  That means I now have to take my car in for a smog check, but then everything else is electronic.

 

[Mrs. Angle continued.]  If they could just electronically do it every other year, the proponents would feel like that would be a burden off the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) and a burden off themselves as well.  Some felt it was a hidden tax because of the reasons that will be presented.  Finally, it is inconsistent.  Not all states have emissions and maintenance tests; not all counties have emissions and maintenance tests.  Also not all areas within the counties that do have those tests are tested. 

 

I’ve included in your packet some constituent letters.  I won’t read the letters, but I will point out some of the things that they say.  One fellow said, “It’s a tax, period.  It’s a revenue stream for auto mechanics.”  Another said, “Please change the law that all cars newer than 1968 models need to be smog tested to a flat 30 years.”  In my research, I found that some states do make a rule stating that cars 30 years old need not be tested, rather than designating a year like we do in Nevada of 1968.  Any car that’s older than 30 years doesn’t have to have a smog check, so that moves up as the years move up.  If we had that 30-year period, it would be that a 1974 or older car would not have a smog check as of next year.  You might hear testimony asking for that.  That isn’t in A.B. 416, but I am very open to that kind of provision.  The third letter says, “I wonder why we must get a smog certificate every year.” 

 

This is an overview of A.B. 416.  In Section 1, subsection 3, it says that we would provide for a frequency change from every year to every two years.  The second part would be compliance evidence would be submitted in even and odd years, according to the date of the first registration, so if you were to register this year, 2003, your next smog check wouldn’t be until 2005.  If you had registered last year, in 2002, your next smog check wouldn’t be until 2004.  Finally, it has an exemption for vehicles 3 years old or newer.  The current law is 2-years-old or newer.  We’re increasing that by a year.  Also, if your car was 4 years old, but had less than 36,000 miles on the odometer, you would be exempted.  This is for some people, especially senior citizens, who don’t put too much mileage on their cars.  They’re saying, “I just don’t drive my car that much.”  Also, classic cars aren’t driven that much; they get them out for “Hot August Nights,” and they have to get a smog check and then they put them right back in the garage, so it’s those situations that we’re trying to hit.  This may be better served with the 30-year limit for classic cars.  That might be for the Committee to decide. 

 

[Mrs. Angle continued.]  Only 10 states have annual smog checks; 17 states don’t have any checks at all.  Michigan, where we make our cars, in Detroit, doesn’t have any smog checks.  You have a chart, Chart Number One, within your packet that shows that 23 of the 33 states smog check biennially.  It shows which 17 states don’t have any smog checks.  You’ll see there are some that are combination states.  Some have an annual check in certain locations; some have a biennial check – I think there are five of those that have the combinations.  Finally, 11 states exempt vehicles 3 years old or newer.  So that would be what we are trying to do.  Nine of these states are under four years and two of them are under five years.  There’s a little bit of a difference there. 

 

Briefly, as background, the 1990 EPA (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) Clean Air Act required manufacturers to build cleaner-burning vehicles.  Actually, this Act began in 1970, and we added stricter controls in 1990.  These controls applied to 70 cities and several states.  The 1990 law required emission and maintenance programs in 40 additional metropolitan areas.  The states were required to have state implementation plans, and there were 15 that had exemptions for vehicles less than 5 years old or older than 25 years.  Nevada set up our current law in 1973 as a reaction to the 1970 Clean Air Act.  In 1977, we put in a provision for counties over 100,000.  In 1981, we amended that to say that some of the areas, even in Clark and Washoe Counties, would be exempted from smog control. 

 

So we have differences even within the counties.  Only Clark County right now has a state implementation plan that is awaiting EPA approval.  Both Clark and Washoe Counties have a “smoking vehicle” program, 686-SMOG; if you see a smoking vehicle you can call it in.  Also NRS (Nevada Revised Statutes) requires mufflers and different preventatives for excessive smoke and fumes, so it’s not like smog checks are our only preventative or measuring device. 

 

Statistically, emissions of the six criteria pollutants regulated by the EPA have decreased by 29 percent.  You’ll see an article included in your packet, plus the references where this information came from.  Our emissions are going down.  The six pollutants have decreased since 1970 by 29 percent.  However, our population has increased by 36 percent, vehicle miles traveled have increased by 143 percent, and total energy consumption has increased by 45 percent.  There is a “decoupling” of air pollution and energy production.  Even though we are using more energy, we are decreasing our emissions.  New cars, 1997 or newer, have 98 percent fewer volatile organic compounds, 96 percent less carbon monoxide, and 89 percent less NO_x [nitrous oxides] per mile.  The ambient concentrations fell between 1980 and 1999.  Here are the six components that were referred to previously: 

 

1. Lead is down 94 percent.
2. Carbon monoxide is down 57 percent.
3. Sulfur dioxide is down 50 percent.
4. Nitrogen dioxide is down 25 percent.
5. Ozone is down 20 percent.
6. Fine particles are down 18 percent. 

 

[Mrs. Angle continued.]  The frequency of smog checks is excessive and inconsistent.  The fees paid for that annual service are not necessary.  Charts 2 and 3 show very little failure if a vehicle is a 1990 or newer, and most vehicles on the road are newer.  If you look at Charts 2 and 3, you’ll see the listing by year in Clark County and Washoe County and the failures.  The law does not stop the smog-emitting vehicles from other areas that come in to work, shop, and do business in the cities.  It is only required in the urban areas of Clark and Washoe.  Those vehicles that are not registered in the areas, but are driven in these populated areas, do not get a smog check.  Rural areas use the urban centers, but they are not checked. 

 

Our beautiful Lake Tahoe basin is in a bowl, and it has no smog check requirements.  It’s in a part of Washoe County that doesn’t have to be smog checked.  On the Nevada side, there are no smog checks; on the California side, there are biennial smog checks.  It’s an inconsistency. 

 

Finally, waivers may be granted if vehicles fail the emissions and maintenance tests and cost over a certain amount to repair.  I’ve included in your packet that waiver that is marked “Notice” (Exhibit E).  It just talks about how, if you can’t pass the smog test, you do a certain amount of repairs, and you still can’t pass, they’ll give you a waiver.  [Mrs. Angle referenced a chart in the packet.]  You can see the overall percentage of failure through 1990; it is less than 10 percent.  In 1989, it increased to 10 percent in Washoe County and in Clark County.  It then moves on down to 1968 where it is only a 25 percent failure.  Even with an annual checkup, we’re not seeing that much failure, and that’s due to the technologies.  The money involved there is where the idea of a hidden tax comes in.  We have a $5 Smog certificate; these are maximums.  Sometimes you can get this done for less.  There’s an electronic transmission surcharge fee that can be charged, and then there is a charge of $10 if you want to get your renewals done there.  These fees vary. 

 

[Mrs. Angle continued.]  Some people say, “What about those who would tamper to defeat their emission devices?”  Certified mechanics will not disable smog systems.  Systems are so complex that owners won’t do it anymore.  They don’t want to risk the voiding of their warranties.  What if newer cars fail?  Like I showed you, less than 1 percent fail.  To keep your warranty valid, you need to maintain your vehicle.  What about the impacts of the “smogging” industry?  As I have shown, this industry has operated since the late 1970s, even before the government mandate.  The mandate is still there.  The smog checks also provide diagnostics for peak efficiency of fuel, performance, and engine life, so there are more reasons than just ecology to get your vehicle smogged. 

 

What if the smog device fails between checks?  That can happen.  You could get your car smogged today, and tomorrow it might fail, or something might go wrong.  It’s that reporting system again, calling on the smoking vehicle.  Or maybe your “check engine” light will come on, and you just need to get it checked.  Smog failures can happen even after annual checkups. 

 

In summary, biennial smog checks save time and money.  Better technology, not smog checks, account for improved environmental conditions.  Smog checks are not required in 17 states; 23 have biennial checks.  The hidden tax is excessive and unnecessary. 

 

I wanted to show you a brief video of some new technology that will make emissions from all vehicles even lower.  This is a March 18 Channel 8 news presentation by Brent Boynton. 

 

[Exhibit F; “AB 359 Fuel Additive (FUELON), Channel 8 TV News, 03/18/03.”  Newscaster Boynton reported on the positive results of using FUELON to reduce smoke in the diesel systems of CitiFare buses and Washoe County School buses.  Model Dairy’s smokestacks also reported benefits.  Mr. Boynton explained that an additional benefit was the money saved by using FUELON, which reduced the amount of fuel needed.  Although it would be difficult to prove, it was also reported that engines seemed to last longer and require less repair when FUELON was used.]

 

I just wanted to show you that there are technologies besides the engine technologies that we’re seeing that will be reducing the emissions more and more.  We’re going to see that annual smog checks just aren’t necessary.

Chairman Collins:

One other person, Marvin Mattson, signed in for this bill.  Are there any questions for the sponsor of the bill?

 

Assemblyman Conklin:

I’m curious.  We’re talking about reducing the number of smog checks with the promise of new technology.  My concern is that part of the reason we have new technology coming on is because we have smog checks.  What’s the incentive for business to continue to pursue technology if we don’t require it of them? 

 

Assemblywoman Angle:

I don’t believe that smog checks are the impetus for new technologies.  The impetus for new technologies has been better fuel efficiency and lower emissions.  I think the smog check is just a diagnostic to see how we’re doing.  It’s not what prevents the emissions in the first place.  I think that the demand for lower emissions has come from the public, and I think that that demand is still there.  We’re not eliminating smog checks; we’re saying that it’s not necessary to do them every year. 

 

Assemblywoman Ohrenschall:

How are you going to prevent losing money if you only have smog checks taking place once every two years?  Are you going to double the cost, or what?

 

Assemblywoman Angle:

Losing money for whom?

 

Assemblywoman Ohrenschall:

Is it going to have a significant economic impact? 

 

Assemblywoman Angle:

I think that you will hear testimony from the smog industry that this will impact their industry.  You’ll note that there are 600 smog stations, I believe, in this state, and this will impact their industry, and they’ll be speaking to that.  As far as fiscal notes, this bill does not have a fiscal note, although I’m not sure about other fiscal impacts that might occur.  You know, that can be mitigated.  Right now, personally, we’re paying $18 a year.  My husband said that he’d be much more willing to pay $36 this year and not have to go through the inconvenience of getting one next year.  To me, it can be mitigated that way. 

 

Assemblywoman Ohrenschall:

I think we still need to have some points, but for the moment it’s sufficient.

 

Marvin Mattson, Private Citizen:

[Introduced himself.]  I agree with most of this bill.  The one thing I do not agree with is the 36,000-mile check, because it will require the person to come in and verify the mileage on their odometer, which, again, takes time out.  If anything, I would amend the bill to say 25 or 30 years back prior to the current year.  If this bill passes, I believe it will probably decrease some of the paperwork that is involved with the Department of Motor Vehicles.  I think they have enough stuff to do already.  It is inconvenient to drive down to get a smog certificate.  To get a smog certificate, usually you are required to drive 10 to 20 miles to warm up the engine.  This could take 20 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour, or 2 hours out of my day to go down to get this certificate.  I could go on a Saturday, but most of the time I’m going to be there during the week.  I’m wondering, Assemblywoman Ohrenschall, whether you are worried about the money going out of the pockets for the smog people.  I want you to worry about the money coming out of my pocket.

 

Assemblywoman Ohrenschall:

I’m not worried about the money.  I’m worried about if there is a change in the flow, where is it going to change?  What are the economic impacts?  Have we looked at them?  Your economic impact as well as the industries’ as well as the state’s.  Because I think it’s better to plan everything, if you can, before you legislate.  It’s not fair to say that I’m only looking at one side, because I’m not.  I look at everything.

 

Marvin Mattson:

Okay.  I look at the money coming out of my pocket.  We’re talking about the emission stations.  They have to buy new equipment just to meet whatever is legislated, to be able to read the smog stuff.  I was at an auction recently where they were auctioning off 15 of the old machines.  I have to drive around to look at competitive prices.  They’re not consistent.  I may go to one place, and it’s $30; I may go to another place, and it’s $22.  We’re talking about people disconnecting different parts of the smog device on their cars.  There are always going to be cheaters; but we’re talking about the majority of us who adhere to the laws of the state.  The other thing is, as far as future emissions, I think the President of the United States just put out a thing where he mandated zero emissions by a certain year.  I think we should look at that also. 

 

Chairman Collins:

I have about 15 people who want to speak against this bill.  [Gave instructions to those testifying in opposition.] 

Allen Biaggi, Administrator, Division of Environmental Protection, Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources: 

[Introduced himself and spoke from prepared testimony, Exhibit G.]  The Nevada Division of Environmental Protection [NDEP] is opposed to A.B. 416.  As written, this bill will have significant fiscal impact on the funding for Nevada’s air quality programs at both the state and local levels.  By requiring the inspection of motor vehicles to occur no more frequently than every two years and requiring the State Environmental Commission to exempt vehicles three years old or newer, the revenue generated through fees assessed at the time of testing would be reduced to less than half.  The NDEP, and other air quality entities in Nevada, rely on this revenue source to partially fund air quality programs.  This significant reduction in revenues would jeopardize existing air programs in Nevada and, most importantly, threaten public health through the reductions in air quality permitting, enforcement, and planning.

 

Secondly, the provisions of the bill would jeopardize federal approval of the Las Vegas Valley carbon monoxide attainment SIP [State Implementation Plans], the proposed maintenance plans in Clark County, and would require significant revisions and reapproval of existing plans in Washoe County.  In doing so, the bill may impact the air quality improvements made in these jurisdictions and may result in air quality degradation in the future.  The inability to meet the requirements contained in these plans may bring about sanctions by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which jeopardizes statewide transportation funds. 

 

While we agree with the general intent of this legislation to reduce the regulatory burden on Nevada motorists, a reduction in testing cannot be passed without full evaluation and remediation of the potential increased pollutant emissions and decreased revenues.

 

We, at the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection, are prepared to work with the bill sponsors to address these issues and insure that statewide air quality programs are preserved and enhanced, and, most importantly, public health is maintained and protected.

 

Joe Johnson, Legislative Advocate, Toiyabe Chapter, Sierra Club:

[Introduced himself.]  We are opposed to this bill, and I believe in Table 2 and Table 3 you can see the reason.  The fail rate of 25 percent on an annual basis represents a significant contribution to the inventory in two nonattainment areas.  The fail rate also doesn’t adequately express what is the gross polluter nature of these failed vehicles, so we don’t really know what the increase in the inventory is based upon.  In general, we are opposed to any diminishment of the annual check, because we interpret this to lead to an increase in the overall pollutants.  Both of the nonattainment areas have had a significant increase or decrease in the numbers of violations over the last ten years.  However, the average exposure to many of the criteria pollutants has not decreased to a very significant level of actual exposure.  Carbon monoxide, for instance, has a very slight decreasing trend line, whereas the actual number of days of violation has decreased significantly.  The hazard represented by the exposure is significant.  There actually is no safe level of exposure to carbon monoxide based upon the physiological impacts. 

 

Lou Gardella, Owner, Jiffy Smog; Co-Chairman, Nevada Emission Testers Council:

[Introduced himself.]  Obviously, we have serious difficulty with this bill in the fact that our industry has made a major investment over time in the emission program here in Nevada.  Just 13 months ago, our industry spent $5 million purchasing new equipment to implement a new program mandated by EPA.  We made this investment based on the laws that EPA has promulgated and the state of Nevada has promulgated in its SIP, which is a 1968 new or annual program.  This obviously is a major deviation from the SIP (State Implementation Plan) that was submitted by Nevada and that we based our investment upon. 

 

One of the Committee members asked about pricing, and this bill provides no provision for any increase in price.  Our tests for emission in Clark County average between $22 and $23; it’s not $31.50, which is obviously $7 for the state and the transmission fees.  The current law only mandates that an annual survey be done, and that’s how the price of the emission test is taken.  Obviously, many of you are business people.  If you cut the volume of cars in half, this bill would take it from probably just over 1 million to, my estimate is 300,000, cars a year.  Obviously, that’s a lot less cars. 

 

We still have to have emission stations; we still have to test cars.  What you’re going to end up having, which is what everyone seems to want, is biennial tests predicated on California.  If any of you have been to California and have seen what the price of a smog check is there, you would be glad to live in Nevada.  You end up, basically, having a test that costs you over twice as much what you’re paying now for the convenience of going every two years.  You’re going to pay more for less.  The SIP, which Clark County can attest to, calls for an annual program.  This is a deviation from it.  That’s our major problem with this bill. 

 

Also, as far as it being inconvenient for a smog test, I will tell you that, in Clark County, it is extremely convenient, it is extremely fast, we do a very good job, and we work very hard at that. 

 

Lastly, [addressing Assemblywoman Angle’s presentation] the price of a test is not $31.56, which is the legal limit; you can get it for a lot less.  She made issue, in her first presentation, by saying cars that were up to eight years old only have a failure rate of less than 1 percent.  That is incorrect by the other documentation you have there; it is much higher than that.  When I started in this business in 1992, there were 22 states doing emission testing; there are now 33 states.  The number of states doing emission testing has increased.  It’s based upon your air quality.  Some regions are serious nonattainment regions, like Clark County, in which you have to do annual programs based on modeling.  Clark County could attest to that.  I don’t know what the diesel video has to do with this bill. 

 

Assemblyman Christensen:

You mentioned what it costs in California.  It made me glad that I live in Nevada.  What is the average cost in California? 

 

Lou Gardella:

California has a highly enhanced program.  Some of them are dynamometer; some of them are two-speed idle tests; some are OBD2 tests.  Some people who worked for me at my company went to California, had to make an appointment, and paid $89 for an emission test.  People whom I talked to earlier said the average test price is $49.  If you are going to do this like a biennial test, we still have to do emission testing here.  You still have to have viable stations, and you want to pay California prices.  Obviously, with reducing the buying of cars, it’s simple supply and demand.  We’re going to be charging a lot more here. 

 

[Chairman Collins invited further testimony.]

 

Mike Prince, Representative, Terrible Herbst:

I agree.

 

Brian Keraly, Representative, Smog Busters, Las Vegas; Cochairman, Nevada Emission Testers Council:

[Introduced himself.]  We have 27 emission stations and 33 emission analyzers. I’m the Cochairman of the Nevada Emission Testers Council.  There’s a two- speed idle test where you put the probe in the tailpipe.  The new test is the OBD2 onboard diagnostics computer test.  Basically you plug in from the emission analyzer to the vehicle’s onboard diagnostic computer system; it checks all the computer controlled emission devices.  It’s still in an advisory period.  The advisory period was supposed to end this last January, which means, in the meantime, the advisory period is . . .  If the vehicle comes in and the “check engine” light is on, it reverts back to the two-speed idle test.  The advisory period was supposed to be over in January, so we’re way behind on the program.  I heard it’s going to start June 1.  The OBD2 failure rate isn’t accurate, as far as I’m concerned, because we haven’t even been doing it long enough to get the information. 

 

[Mr. Keraly continued.]  The other thing is about biennial.  You’ve got the people now that come in.  A lot of people think, “I’d better get my car tuned up or change my oil.  I’m going to get a smog check, and I might fail.”  Then you have the people who just figure, “I’ll just get it done, and then if I fail, I’ll get my car tuned up, or whatever.”  People are going to be putting that off.  They are going to go two years now instead of getting a tune-up or oil change. 

 

Andrew Goodrich, Division Director, Washoe County District Health Department, Air Quality Management Division:

[Introduced himself and spoke from prepared testimony, Exhibit H.]  I am here today to testify in opposition to the amendments proposed in A.B. 416.  I would like to present my concern in three specific areas.

 

First, if this bill were to pass, it would represent a significant funding reduction for the air quality program in Washoe County.  Currently, the funds collected by this program account for approximately 15 percent of the air quality programs’ revenue.  These monies pay for the maintenance and operation of our ambient air quality monitoring program.  With shrinking local county funds, and federal monies being threatened by other priorities, any additional short fall in revenues would result in program service reductions.

 

Second, Washoe County is officially designated by the U.S. EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) as a nonattainment area for ozone and carbon monoxide, and a serious non-attainment area for particulate matter.  In other words, the citizens in Washoe County have been exposed to air quality that does not meet federal health standards.  We have seen great improvements in air quality in the last decade; however, we’re not “out of the woods” yet, and now is not the time to reduce programs designed to clean up our air. 

 

In response to these designations, the District Health Department, along with our partners at NDEP (Nevada Division of Environmental Protection), DMV (Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles), private businesses, and the public have crafted regulations for an effective and federally approved inspection and maintenance program for motor vehicles.  To drastically restructure the I&M (Inspection and Maintenance) program would require significant revisions to air quality plans necessary to reach the goal of clean air.  To be federally acceptable, these plans, known as State Implementation Plans or SIPs, must show progress towards clean air or otherwise risk being disapproved resulting in possible sanctions such as highway funds being reduced.

 

[Mr. Goodrich continued.]  Finally, and the most important concern, is the air quality.  The proposed changes would result in the increase in emissions from the single largest source of pollutants in the state of Nevada, motor vehicles.  Some may argue that the increase would be minimal and could be offset by other controls.  However, due to the magnitude of the emissions contribution made by motor vehicles, even small percentage increases from this source would result in large impacts to local air quality.  I have heard the argument that California only tests vehicles every other year, so why can’t we?  It must be understood that California implements a different test procedure that is a more rigorous test utilizing a dynamometer, or, basically, a treadmill for cars.  Consequently, the test requires much more time to conduct and is significantly more expensive to the public than the test in Nevada. 

 

In summary, the Washoe District Health Department is opposed to the A.B. 416 amendments because they will result in significant lost revenues to the local air quality programs.  The changes may not be acceptable in federal air quality planning documents resulting in cuts to federal highway funds.  Finally, this bill will result in increased air pollution in the two counties already exceeding the federal health standards.

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

How much have you gained on air pollution?

 

Andrew Goodrich:

We’ve made significant progress.  A lot of it is due to increased technology in the motor vehicles themselves.  However, we still occasionally exceed those federal health standards.  We have not exceeded since 1999; however, every year, every wintertime, we come very close to that.  We are making improvements.  In the 1980s, we would have 20 to 30 of those violations.  Now, we may have only one a year.

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

Do you think we will ever get away from nonattainment?

 

Andrew Goodrich:

I think we will. 

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

How long do you think it will take?

 

Andrew Goodrich:

I would like to think in the next decade or so.  I think, in the next decade, we will be in the attainment, but I think we are going to have to be vigilant in our controls of those populated areas. 

 

Chairman Collins:

You don’t allow wood burning every day like you used to.

 

James Sohns, President, Nevada Car Owners Association; Member, Clark County Air Quality Committee:

[Introduced himself and provided Exhibit I.]  If this were a classic vehicle bill, I’d support it, but it’s not.  We can do a “rolling 25” in talking to Lloyd Nelson, through the Nevada Environmental Commission, so that’s not a major concern.  If I had my way, all smog tests would be gone, but that’s my personal opinion.  Coming from the side of Clark County air quality, my concern is that the SIP has been submitted under a yearly annual testing.  One or two sessions ago, this same type of bill was presented.  Jolene Johnson from NDEP, Jack Grackle, and I referred to numerous studies that were done by DRI (Desert Research Institute) and other agencies that stated the computer cars were, in fact, a major problem, because, when that “check engine” light came on, the sensor got bad.  It was a major gross polluter.  Do you want to know what Californians do now when the “check engine” light comes on?  They put a piece of black tape over the “check engine” light so you don’t see it. 

 

If you are going to do the emission testing, do it annually, like Mr. Goodrich says.  Get people in there every year.  Don’t let them drag it out.  If you’re going to do the program, do it right.  Just to let you know, if the SIP is so important, we have submitted 33 pounds of paperwork against the SIP.  It has to be done right, or everybody’s in trouble.  If it isn’t done right, and we get federal money, then the SIP is kicked back, because now we are going by the 1979 SIP in Clark County, because of paperwork we filed in court.  It needs to be done right.  Don’t take a chance on blowing that.

 

Dan Musgrove, Director, Legislative Advocate, Office of the Clark County Manager:

[Introduced himself.]  I would just echo the comments of Mr. Goodrich with Washoe County.  Just magnify those problems by double or triple in Clark County.  In terms of the revenue, obviously we do over a million smog tests a year.  That works out to about $2.5 million lost to air pollution control that we need in Clark County to maintain our SIP that we have just submitted.  This obviously would severely hamper the approval by the EPA.  To be in containment is important to federal transportation dollars, as well as the health of Clark County residents.  The people who testified before me “hit it on the head,” and I appreciate that.  We are against the bill.

 

Lloyd Nelson, Emission Control Manager, Management Services and Programs Division, Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles:

[Introduced himself and spoke from prepared testimony, Exhibit J.  He also provided a copy of “Nevada’s Motor Emission Control Program,” Exhibit K.]  In addition to the concerns expressed by the air quality agencies and the fiscal impact related to biennial inspection of vehicle emissions, the Department has concerns with a portion of Section 3 of A.B. 416, which is NRS 445B.825.  Under Section 3, lines 11 and 12, it states, “Four years old or older” that have less than 36,000 miles registered on the odometer.  There are many vehicles in operation that have odometers that only read up to 99,999 miles.  The proposed language would exempt vehicles with such an odometer that read in excess of 99,999 miles, but less than 36,000 miles.  If this was brought into the program, such an exemption would likely require a procedure requiring motorists to drive down to DMV to obtain an exemption form based upon the odometer inspection by a department representative.  This requirement has the potential to affect our current efforts of providing our customers the ability to renew their vehicle registration through Internet and telephone alternative services, without having to physically go to a DMV office.  So we feel it would be a burden.

 

Chairman Collins:

This is the last testifier before we close the hearing on this bill.  Does anybody have any questions from the Committee?  [There were none.]  We will close the hearing on A.B. 416.  Assemblywoman Angle, you have heard the questions, so you know what to address. 

 

We will open the hearing on A.B. 447. 

 

Assembly Bill 447:  Makes various changes concerning management of solid waste. (BDR 40-492)

 

One of the members of our Committee will also testify, so we will let him join the first group.  This is a Committee-sponsored bill.  Glenn Miller, Jason Geddes, and Joe Johnson are in favor of this bill. 

 

Dave Emme, Chief, Bureau of Environmental Information and Planning, Division Environmental Protection, Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources:

[Introduced himself and spoke from prepared testimony (Exhibit L).]  The division is proposing A.B. 447 in an effort to improve the state’s recycling efforts, to enhance certain permitting and enforcement procedures, to make various technical corrections, and to correct what we perceive as an inequity in our source of revenue for state solid waste and recycling programs by substituting a fee on waste disposal for the current fee on the retail sale of tires.

 

[Dave Emme continued.]  We have provided each of you with a copy of our 2003 State Recycling Status Report (Exhibit M).  This report provides background information and statistics regarding recycling in Nevada.  The Executive Summary, on page 1, outlines the basic provisions of A.B. 447, and Section 1 of the report describes the rationale for these provisions.

 

Let me begin by addressing the matter of program funding.  For the past ten years, a $1 fee applied to the retail sale of motor vehicle tires has funded Nevada’s solid waste program, including state and local regulatory programs governing municipal and industrial landfills, and our program to promote recycling and waste reduction.  In fiscal year 2002, tire fees generated approximately $1.4 million.  The revenue derived from these tire fees is deposited in the Solid Waste Management Account and allocated as follows:  NDEP receives 44.5 percent, Clark County Health District receives 30 percent, Washoe County District Health Department receives 25 percent, and, for the services of collecting this fee, the Department of Taxation receives 0.5 percent.

 

Our proposal is to retain the same allocation structure but repeal the tire fee, as accomplished in Section 15, and to replace it with a fee on waste disposal, described in Section 1 of the bill.  The 30 cents-per-ton fee on waste disposal is set at an amount so that, overall, Nevadans wouldn’t be paying any more in disposal fees than they were paying right now in tire fees.  Our reasons for proposing this change are straightforward.

 

Fundamentally, applying a fee on waste disposal to fund waste management programs is more consistent with the concept of a “user fee” than is a fee on the retail sale of tires.  Tires only account for 2 percent of solid waste generated in Nevada, yet tire fees pay for 100 percent of the waste management programs.

 

Also, since Nevada receives solid waste from out of state, Nevada tire fees, in essence, subsidize the cost of regulation of this imported waste.  In 2002, Nevada received 535,000 tons of trash from California.  While we cannot legally apply a discriminatory fee solely on this imported waste, a fee applied to waste disposal, regardless of origin, means that the generators of this imported waste pay their fair share for the costs of regulation.

 

[Dave Emme continued.]  I have provided a handout (Exhibit N) with a table that shows annual tire fee revenue, waste disposal amounts, and predicted revenue that would be derived from a fee on waste disposal.  I’ll note that on the top line the existing tire fee is listed as 95 cents.  That’s because the tire dealers get to keep a nickel of each dollar they collect as the cost of collecting that fee.  I’ll also note that in the middle of that table where it lists “estimate of Class II waste disposal,” Class II landfills are very small landfills that receive less than 20 tons of waste per day.  We’re proposing to not apply this fee on waste disposals to these very small sites, so we’re subtracting that off in making our calculations.  Again, the idea is that Nevadans pay the same amount in waste fees as they were paying in tire fees, but there is a modest increase in overall revenue because the waste fee captures the imported waste.  The Division’s share of this additional revenue would be used to make available recycling grants to local governments.

 

With that overview of the funding, I would like to just briefly review the other sections of the bill and also reference a couple of minor amendments (Exhibit O) that we wanted to make.

 

Section 3 of the bill proposes to require that new regional disposal sites apply for a certificate of designation prior to submitting an application for a permit.  This additional process, which is borrowed from our hazardous waste program, is simply intended to provide an opportunity to review the relative risks and the public benefits of a new disposal site that has regional significance.  We are proposing amendments to subsections 3 and 4 and to the definition of “regional disposal site,” in subsection 5, by adding a threshold to the definition of “regional disposal site” to indicate those that receive over 1,000 tons per day, we’re talking about large sites, not small sites. 

 

Section 4 of the bill is simply a collection of technical corrections to existing statute.

 

Section 5 clarifies and enhances our enforcement authority.  Subsection 2 makes generators of solid waste responsible for the legal disposal of their solid waste.  It provides authority for the division to issue enforcement orders to generators of waste if, for example, they have sent their waste to an illegal disposal site, and the operator of the illegal site is unable or unwilling to take the necessary action.

 

Sections 6 and 7 are merely technical changes, providing for correct references.

 

Section 8 proposes to revise reporting requirements for recycling information.  Under the current scheme, each municipality collects information from recyclers and submits a summary report to the division that is used to compute statewide and local recycling rates.  This reporting system is a burden for local governments, and compliance has been uneven.  We propose to have recycling reports submitted directly to the division, rather than through local governments, and to establish authority to audit reports to verify their accuracy and provide for a modest penalty for failure to report, although we believe our proposed penalty of $100 is too modest.  We suggest an amendment to establish a $500 fine for failure to report, which is more consistent with other fines for reporting violations that we have.

 

[Dave Emme continued.]  Section 9 provides the division with the authority to award grants to nonprofit institutions and municipalities and requires the adoption of regulations and coordination with local authorities regarding these grants.  The division has, for several years, provided contract support to various recycling projects.  We have been advised that grants are a more appropriate mechanism to provide this type of support.

 

Section 10 is a technical cross-reference.

 

Section 11 enhances recycling by including multifamily dwellings in curbside collection programs in Clark and Washoe Counties and, by making recycling information more readily available to businesses, through the business licensing process.  These provisions respond directly to two concerns that we have heard often from Clark County.  First, recycling opportunities for apartment dwellers are limited at best, and, second, commercial recycling needs to be promoted and information made available to new businesses in particular.

 

Section 12 requires municipalities that adopt a recycling program to appoint a recycling coordinator and adopt ordinances that require new large office buildings and apartment complexes to include storage space for recyclables in their applications for building permits.  These provisions also respond to concerns expressed in Clark County that there is no local recycling coordinator to actively promote recycling and provide recycling information, and that lack of available storage space causes some building owners to resist recycling collection programs.  Note that we propose to amend subsections 1 and 2 to clarify that these requirements apply only to the more populated counties. 

 

Section 12 also revises the frequency at which local governments must review their recycling programs from every three years to every two years and requires the findings of the review be submitted to the division.

[Dave Emme continued.]  Section 13 is a minor change to the notice that tire dealers must post to more accurately indicate that waste tires accepted by them may be either disposed of or recycled.  Currently, most of the tires that they accept are disposed of. 

 

Section 14 includes a minor addition to the division’s recycling responsibilities by adding a recognition program.

 

Sections 15 through 17 include sections of statute that are proposed to be repealed, technical reference to local government funding provisions, and an effective date for the act.

 

We believe that these modifications of the solid waste requirements of the state of Nevada will result in more equitable program funding, enhance Nevada’s recycling efforts, and serve to make a healthier and cleaner environment for Nevada’s citizens and visitors.

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

How many illegal disposal sites have you identified?

 

Dave Emme:

We’ve closed down a large number of “open dumps.”  I don’t have an inventory of how many illegal disposal sites there are.  There are a couple of disposal sites, one in particular that we’re in litigation over.  It’s occupying a lot of our time, but we don’t have a large number. 

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

What are the sanctions?

 

Dave Emme:

The sanctions for illegal disposal sites?  We have the authority to seek civil penalties of $5,000 a day.

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

Have you ever implemented the sanctions? 

 

Dave Emme:

We have sought and collected penalties for various violations. 

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

How much?  Do you have any idea?

Dave Emme:

Actually, we have a case right now where we are seeking penalties of $250,000. 

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

Where is this located?

 

Dave Emme:

That’s a site in Lincoln County. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Have we seen any money?

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

Lincoln County needs the money.

 

Assemblyman Goicoechea:

You talk about an average of 20 tons or more, even if you are in Category 2.  Is that an annual average?  In Section 1, it says “the owner or operator of a disposal site that receives an average of 20 tons or more” will impose a 30-cent fee.  It says an average.  What time frame are we using for the average?

 

Dave Emme:

That is an annual average.  That 20 tons-per-day distinction is used in federal regulations to distinguish between large from small landfills.  Their regulatory requirements differ for the large and small landfills.  For convenience, we chose to use that threshold in applying this fee to the larger landfills, not the smaller ones. 

 

Assemblyman Goicoechea:

That includes “c” and “d” construction debris and all?  Right?  If they’re taking it into the disposal site? 

 

Dave Emme:

Right.

 

Assemblyman Goicoechea:

If you had a big project going, you could really drive that even in a Category 2 fill.

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

What do you think is going to happen to all these tires now?

 

Dave Emme:

We’ve been collecting this tire fee for ten years.  There are 44 other states that have established tire fees.  Of those, Nevada is the only state that does not use its tire fee to manage tires.  We use our tire fee revenue to support our regulatory program.  Most other states use a fee on waste disposal, to manage their waste regulatory programs.  It would be nice to be able to use tire fee revenue to support recycling or some beneficial use of tires, but in the interests of not imposing a new fee, our proposal here is to substitute one fee for another.  Since we’re not using the tire fee for tires, it’s more appropriate to have a fee on waste to deal with waste management.  As to the disposition of waste tires in the future, the vast majority of the waste tires that we generate in Nevada are disposed of in landfills. 

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

At least in Elko, the tire dealers take care of most of them.  I guess they take them to the dump.  Is there any rule or regulation that anybody can take these tires to the dump?  Are the tires all going to end up out in the desert? 

 

Dave Emme:

Nothing in this bill really affects the current regulatory scheme governing waste tires.  We have a set of regulations that specifically govern waste tires and govern haulers of waste tires.  We register haulers of waste tires to provide some means of tracking.  We regulate them, and that’s not going to go away.  Instead of paying for that regulatory scheme, along with the landfill regulatory scheme with the fee on tires, we’re proposing that we pay for it with a fee on waste.  We still are going to regulate waste tires in the same way that we have been. 

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

What is the real reason that recycling doesn’t work?  I have been here for 18 years, and I’ve been hearing about recycling for 18 years.  I remember one time we went to Clark County, and there were mountains of old milk jugs; they couldn’t get rid of them.  Nobody would take them.  Is there really any market out there now for any of these products, or are we in the same situation with all of the recyclables as we were in with the milk jugs?  Can you give me an answer?

 

Dave Emme:

There are many factors that go into making recycling work.  It takes an active effort to develop markets in your region.  It takes an effort to educate the public to provide information to businesses as to the opportunities available for recycling.  It takes an effort on the part of municipalities to make programs and collection services available.  It takes an effort to support the businesses that work in the recycling industry to help them be successful.  Recycling is not just a “warm and fuzzy” good idea anymore; it’s actually an active, vital industry that’s part of the institution across the nation.  Our recycling rate has fluctuated between 10 and 15 percent, and, if we invested a lot of time and effort as California and Oregon have done, and adopted mandates as well as strict and tough laws, we could probably achieve 50 percent.  No one seems to really want that.  What we are proposing are some real modest ideas to try to boost the information that’s available and improve the recycling rate to at least achieve the goal of 25 percent that the Legislature has set. 

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

Can you supply me with some ideas of how they’re recycling in other places that apparently we don’t have in Nevada?  In small communities, there are just not enough recycling materials to make it pay.  Maybe you have some information that I don’t know about.

 

Dave Emme:

I would be happy to provide information regarding programs in other areas, particularly programs that exist in rural areas that are successful. 

 

Chairman Collins:

You put the guy out at the dump with his flatbed truck; you let him collect all that stuff; you cut the profit with him; and he takes it down and sells it to the scrapper.  Do you have scrappers in Elko? 

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

We have aluminum can collections.

 

Chairman Collins: 

They make roads with the tires you haul to Arizona. 

 

Assemblyman Conklin:

If we cut the $1 fee on tires and we add the 30 cents fee, what’s the change in money coming into your department?  In other words, how much are you making on tires currently?  How much will you make under your proposed change?

 

Dave Emme:

If you refer to the table (Exhibit N), I think that will answer your question.  The fourth line down shows tire revenue.  The middle lines are basically showing waste disposal.  At the bottom, in the boxes on comparing tire fee revenue with waste disposal fee revenue, Nevadans aren’t paying any more in fees.  But, because we are capturing this imported waste, we’re going to realize a net increase in revenue, not a large increase, but a modest increase.

 

Assemblyman Jason Geddes, Washoe County District No. 24:

[Introduced himself.]  I will be brief and ask that my written testimony (Exhibit P) be submitted into the record.  I will discuss a few highlights.  Most of my testimony is derived from the NDEP Solid Waste Department in their recycling statistics, as well as a study that was performed last year in Clark County by the Telesis Institute for EPA Region 9.  That is in the back of the document that NDEP handed out to you. 

 

Basically, the study stated that the recycling program in Clark County is not going well.  Some of the specific issues that they brought up for improving the recycling rate in Clark County were the addition of multifamily unit buildings to the curbside recycling program.  That is in A.B. 447, and I would encourage you to pass the bill, at least with that option in it.  In 1991, NRS 444A.020 was added, and it created a goal of 25 percent that this state would achieve in recycling.  Per this year’s statistics, Washoe County has met the goal.  Clark County’s numbers have continually gone down.  On the very last page of my handout, you will see statistics for Clark and Washoe Counties, and you will see the recycling rate in Clark County going down every year. 

 

There are two important reasons for this performance.  These are poor markets for recyclables, to address Mr. Carpenter’s questions, as well as a lack of convenient recycling in Nevada.  An analysis shows that, if there’s a more convenient method of recycling, people will continue to recycle the materials regardless.  I was most recently in Redding, California, a town of approximately 80,000 people.  They have curbside recycling next to their 96-gallon tote for garbage.  Actually they have a much smaller one; it’s a 56-gallon tote for garbage.  They have a 56-gallon tote for their yard waste and lawn clippings, and, next to it, they have a 30-gallon tote for recycling.  They put all three of those out to the curb every week.  They are well above a 50 percent recycling rate.

 

One option we can put in there is the fee that is currently assessed in Clark County be assessed to every resident in Clark County with garbage collection service for curbside recycling, whether or not they receive that service, such as in a multifamily dwelling.  One option to make people aware of the opportunities is to print the breakout of that fee on the bill.  If people see that they are paying for recycling, regardless of whether they get it or not, they may be asking for that service to be extended.  According to psychological principles, environmentally responsible behaviors are often matters of personal habit or household routine.  The current every other week program tends to break that routine, and people have to take an active responsibility in determining if it’s their week or not.  If you can make it a weekly program, just like your garbage can, you can get a lot more participation in it.  Also, if you shrink the size of the solid waste dumpster that’s being picked up, you can get a little more diversion on that side. 

 

[Assemblyman Geddes continued.]  An analysis by the EPA study shows that, if the franchises increased recycling, they would also increase their own profit.  I did speak with Republic Services of Southern Nevada just before the meeting, and they have numbers that dispute the EPA number.  I would encourage you to listen to that as well; but the basic issue that you need to look at is that nothing is improving in Clark County right now.  None of the numbers in the Telesis Report or the NDEP show an improvement.  We need to do something to make Clark County adhere to NRS, or we can toss the law out, if that’s what we want to do.  Right now we have a law stating they need to get 25 percent, and we’re not getting there. 

 

The last few highlights that came out of the EPA report changed the biennial advertising to a triennial advertising prepared by NDEP with the franchises sending it out to all of their customers.  Currently, NDEP is responsible for the whole program of advertising.  The report also advised to send out flyers providing detailed information about what can and cannot be recycled, how to properly prepare recyclables, where the drop-off locations are needed, as well as where you can take other items that aren’t in the standard curbside program. 

 

The pro-environmental behaviors become more probable when an individual is aware of harmful consequences to others from the state of the environment and when that person ascribes that responsibility to himself for changing the offending environmental condition.  One problem we have in Nevada right now is that we have so much vast land, so much open land, that we have huge landfills, one in Washoe County and one in Clark County.  We have no problem with capacity.  I think the years quoted to me were 210 years to 400 years in the two landfills to just dump all of our garbage, so there is no incentive on that end.  One incentive that needs to be in there is, if we’re going to continue to take all of this out to the landfills, and the markets are not currently available, we need to segregate the recyclables and put them into separate sections of the landfills. 

 

When we’re talking about plastics, we need to talk about oil.  The current world situation will tell you the importance of oil, and, if you look at the oil reserves, from the conservative estimates to the most generous estimates, they are large enough for anywhere from 20 to 50 years.  The oil that we have in the reserves, we need to use for our cars and to heat our homes.  To take plastic that has already been made into plastic, and just throw it away and not reuse it, is inefficient, in a global sense, and, in a local sense, we are consuming oil that we greatly need for other products. 

 

[Assemblyman Geddes continued.]  One of those is the medical industry; it relies very heavily on plastic.  Those plastics come from oil.  They can come from recycled plastics.  We are becoming increasingly dependent in the medical industry on plastics, and we cannot just throw this into a landfill.  We need to be able to get it back out when we need it.  I would suggest, if we’re going to continue to keep filling up these landfills, we segregate it, stockpile it, and then pull it out when we need it, when the market bears the recovery costs.

 

Basically, that is all I would like to enter into the record.  As I mentioned, I did talk to the Clark County disposal company before the meeting.  We weren’t able to come to an entire agreement, but we didn’t have much time to talk.  I would be happy to work with anybody on issues in which we can improve the program.  They will mention that some of the statistics you are looking at are not accurate.  That is entirely likely.  One thing we need to do, and I think there was a proposal in here, is improve the statistics.  We don’t know how well we’re doing.  It looks like we’re doing poorly based on the EPA and NDEP reports, and we need to do whatever we can to improve that.  We need to make sure that, just because we have space to throw it away, we don’t do it.

 

Chairman Collins:

Do you have a sorting facility in northern Nevada, like we do down in Clark County?

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

Yes, we do. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Our numbers in Clark County are about three times what Washoe is, but you’re saying we should be tighter than that.  As a percentage, it doesn’t reach as much. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

Correct, as a percentage it’s not as much. 

 

Chairman Collins:

You have recycling facilities up north here as well?

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

Correct.

Glenn Miller, Private Citizen:

[Introduced himself.]  I was involved in a class that developed model legislation that was used as a basis for the recycling legislation back in 1991.  I would like to make a point that the model legislation that we used was a national legislation that was modified considerably by the Legislature in that it had what was called a “tipping fee,” which is the same as that being proposed.  Philosophically, the fees that you pay for recycling are ones where you discourage dumping of garbage into a landfill so the appropriate fee is as proposed in this legislation and was actually initially proposed in the legislation in 1991.  When you essentially dump garbage, there’s a fee assessed to that.  Anything that minimizes the amount of garbage that you dump would decrease those costs.  It’s called a tipping fee, and that’s what is proposed. 

 

In the same bill, we suggested there should be $1 per tire fee because tires are difficult to get rid of.  They were difficult then; they are still difficult.  There is a lot of technology that has been developed.  Because of the anathema towards a tipping fee, the only way this legislation could get through was to take the tire fee.  It makes no sense to use a tire fee to pay for the recycling program, but that was the only way, politically, it could happen. 

 

This legislation, which I support, corrects that change from the model legislation that “all the smart guys in the United States back in those days” created.  They said, “This is the way we want to do it.  We want to have a tipping fee, and, by the way, we should have a tire fee.”  This legislation gets rid of the tire fee, and I suggest that you consider retaining that, because tires are still a problem.  But, at the very least, it does put the cost on a method that will tend to reduce the amount of waste going into the landfill. 

 

The other thing that I think is important is that California now charges a tipping fee.  When they send that garbage to Nevada, they don’t have to pay that fee.  It turns out they have to pay another fee.  We are actually subsidizing California’s importation of garbage, in one sense, because we don’t have any fee for disposal.  It’s okay to have California pay part of our recycling bill in Nevada, if they are bringing waste over here. 

 

Joe Johnson:

I have had experience in the formulation of the recycling program when I served in 1991.  I suggest that Sierra Club supports the solid waste management program, as well as recycling.  We support the implementation of a tipping fee.  I think it’s only appropriate that revenue from the material disposed of should be used to fund the program to manage the solid waste management, including recyclables.  Recycling is not the only issue that comes before the state and the county programs, and this revenue will fund additional programs.  I think the recycling programs are underfunded and should be funded at a level that would reach at least to the level of what some of the better programs in the nation have achieved.  Fifty percent is probably much too high to expect in our environment, but there are, as Assemblyman Geddes referenced, cities and communities that do achieve a much higher percentage than what we do. 

 

John Pappageorge, Legislative Advocate, Republic Services of Southern Nevada, Las Vegas:

[Introduced himself.]  I was prepared to make a long speech, but I’m going to leave that to the presidents of Republic and Reno Disposal.  They will have more technical data and may cover some of the things we covered with Mr. Geddes regarding reporting.  We found even more mistakes that they may want to point out today. 

 

Steve Kalish, President, Republic Services of Southern Nevada, Las Vegas:

[Introduced himself.]  I’d like to call attention to a couple of things.  I listened to the state talk about how they came about putting a fee on solid waste.  One of the things that’s important for you to know is our rates are all set by the franchise and by ordinance in both Reno and northern and southern Nevada.  Part of that rate structure is also disposals, so when we go out and negotiate contracts with municipalities, it’s an all win proposition.  There is no way for us to pass back this per-ton fee that is being suggested today.  One of the other problems with this fee is, being in the business for 30 years, I don’t understand how I can take a 30 cents-per-ton fee and spread it out equally to all my different customers.  Residentially, some senior citizens may generate 10 pounds per week, and a family of five may generate 50 pounds.  I don’t know how you would do that economically and correctly for the customer so that it’s fair. 

 

I think one important issue is recycling; the other part is generating some money to support NDEP.  Somewhere between 20 million and 30 million people a year come to southern Nevada, and they generate waste.  That is a waste stream that probably represents about 50 percent of our total.  There’s no way to attack it; there’s no way to recycle it.  It’s a very difficult waste stream to get at, and, as I suggested to Assemblyman Geddes, we’d rather have them playing the machines or sitting in restaurants generating waste and generating tax dollars than sitting in rooms separating newspapers. 

 

As we talk about Section 3, they talk about designation of landfills.  One of the interesting things is that the biggest issue facing you and facing the state is the importation of solid waste into the state of Nevada.  Yet, in Section 3, NDEP failed to add the demonstration of need.  The Lockwood Landfill probably has 200 to 400 years of life in it; the APEX landfill probably has 207 years of life.  I don’t know why we would want to continue putting more landfills in this state only to benefit California and Utah, so we’d import more waste.  I would ask that in Section 3, if this bill proceeds, we have a demonstration of need for landfills.  

 

[Mr. Kalish continued.]  The $100 fine in Section 8, paragraph 4, as it talks about recycling, is one of the failures, I think, of Mr. Emme’s presentation.  I think Assemblyman Marvel was talking about illegal landfills.  We have one in Lincoln County that has somewhere between 500,000 and a million yards of garbage that was under the guise of recycling.  This $100 fee would be a joke to them because they probably generated $12 million to $20 million of revenue at that site.  If you’re going to put a fine in, let’s make it so that it’s one that people will respect, and they’ll adhere to this law. 

 

As we talk about multifamily recycling and business recycling, one of the things that both Reno Disposal and Republic in southern Nevada have struggled with is how to get multifamily people to recycle.  We’ve tried recycling in between 400 and 800 different apartment complexes in southern Nevada.  We probably have 200 up there now.  One of the problems is, if you don’t make it simple and convenient enough, and you don’t have the space for it, it winds up being garbage.  What we’ve found most of the time with multifamily complexes is, we’ll put a container right next to a garbage container, and we get both in each one.  It’s a very difficult program to do.  When it comes to multifamily, I think that, as a company, we will continue to pursue a better way of multifamily recycling, but to write a law that would mandate it would make enforcement very difficult. 

 

As far as hiring a recycling coordinator in Section 12, we have recycling people within the health district, and we have recycling people within the municipalities.  I don’t know that hiring another recycling coordinator is going to accomplish very much other than just add an additional cost. 

 

I think we go back to the money on the tax, and this is just one more additional tax that we would have to pass on to our customers or your constituents, and it really will not generate anything good for the community.  It’s just going to be $1 million to $1.5 million for southern Nevada and $500,000 to $600,000 for northern Nevada that somehow is going to get passed down to our customers.  I don’t know what the benefit is. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes, if I could address some of your issues here.  I know that in private we talked about the Telesis Report.  I want to point out a couple of things so that we make sure that we identify . . .

 

Chairman Collins:

Don’t get too involved because we’re running out of time.

 

John Pappageorge:

Perhaps we could meet with Assemblyman Geddes and address these issues. 

 

Steve Kalish:

I would like to point out a couple of things.  The two charts on the back were produced by the Telesis Report.  The numbers are flawed; the calculations are wrong.  I’ll assure you that, if there were $11 million of value in my company, I would have found it before the Telesis Institute would have found it. 

 

The second part is I would like you all to look at 2002.  If you look at Clark County, we obviously went down 400,000 tons.  We’re reporting differently, which means if my calculations are right, we’re actually at about a 15.7 percent diversion rate and not a 4 percent or 10 percent rate as everyone is saying.  So, as you stated, the numbers are going down.  I think the numbers, when accurately reported, are actually going up to 15 or 16 percent.  It’s also important to note in Washoe that 23 percent includes rendering from a stockyard.  Four, five, or six points of that is rendering, which suggests to you that if they stop rendering, that will all drop off. 

 

Lastly, I’d like to talk about Redding, California, regarding yard waste.  Ninety percent of yard waste in California that needs to be separated at the curb is winding up back at the landfill as landfill cover.  One thing my customers don’t want me to do is ask them to separate this waste, make me spend a lot of money to do it, and then use it for cover on top of a landfill.  It ended up in the same place.  All you’d have to do is visit some landfills in California, and you’d find yard waste used as alternative cover on top of a landfill. 

 

With that said, we would oppose this bill.

 

Chairman Collins: 

Did you discuss raising the tire fee?

 

Steve Kalish:

No, we did not. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Do you have an issue with that?

 

Steve Kalish:

No, we don’t.

Tom Green, Vice President, Reno Disposal Waste Management:

[Introduced himself.]  I don’t want to repeat what Mr. Kalish has already said.  I just want to go on record that we oppose this.  We feel that what creates recycling is a market to sell it and not picking it up at the curb.  If there is a market, we’ll be able to recycle.  They talked about $11 million on this bill.  If we could sell our waste for $11 million, we’d be down there handpicking it; but there’s nowhere to get rid of it.  We’re currently doing all the recycling in the Reno area, which is our biggest item.  It costs us money to ship glass, so we’re losing money every time we recycle.  In order to increase recycling, you have to increase the market, not the produce.  We can get the product; you have to increase the market.  Adding a fee to recycling does not do that.  It discourages people from recycling.  We’re opposed to it. 

 

Chairman Collins:

It costs money to clean up the place.  That’s what recycling is going to do for until the market generates.  I “scrap” regularly, aluminum, copper, and what not.  It’s part of my business.  Glass and paper – I’m not into bulk and pennies; I’m into dollars. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

You mentioned the fee and tax that’s put on garbage.  If you are currently imposing a fee on every residential customer in Clark County, whether or not they get a recycling service, are you making money without necessarily giving the service?

 

Steve Kalish:

That’s not correct. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

So how is the curbside recycling program in Clark County funded, and how does each customer pay for it?

 

Steve Kalish:

Every customer gets a bill for solid waste.  Part of the service is curbside recycling.  One of the first things they get every year is three baskets and that’s at a cost.  Whether or not they use those baskets, they are delivered to them, so there’s always an expense to every customer.  Those baskets probably cost $20 to $25 a set.  As you know, you see more of them in the back of pickups in southern Nevada with plumbing parts in them than you do with newspapers at the curb for us. 

Assemblyman Geddes:

My second question:  you said we don’t want tourists sitting in their hotel rooms recycling newspapers.  I think that’s a grand overstatement.  I think if you put a recycling opportunity bin next to every garbage can where a person with a beer bottle can toss it, as opposed to tossing it in the garbage, it’s not much effort on anybody’s part.  I would take a little offense to that.  The comment about me selectively picking the numbers, I take great offense to because I pulled that straight off the NDEP (Nevada Division of Environmental Protection) Web site from the numbers that were reported into NDEP.  If you have a problem with the numbers, I did not selectively choose them; I pulled them from NDEP.  I would bring that issue up. 

 

Lastly, you mentioned putting the fee on recycling.  We’re not talking about putting a fee on recycling; we’re talking about putting a fee on waste going into a landfill.  That wouldn’t discourage recycling at all.  That would encourage recycling because, if you have less waste, you would pay less. 

 

Tom Green:

The fee is already incorporated in the garbage bill.  If you add that fee somebody’s going to call and ask, “Why did our garbage service go up?”  What is the answer?  Is it to support recycling?  It doesn’t make any sense to me.  That’s my position. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

Okay.  That’s fair.  I do want to state on the record that I want to do whatever I can to make this program work.  I’d be happy to work with Republic, with Reno Disposal, with anybody who has an interest in this issue to come up with proper reporting requirements, proper diversion techniques, and some alternative ways that maybe we can get this program going.  But we’ve had this in the law for 12 years.  We are nowhere near our target goal of 25 percent.  I would love to do anything to get us nearer that goal. 

 

Steve Kalish:

As far as hotels are concerned, I think I would encourage you, when you’re down in southern Nevada, to go over to MGM and see the volumes that they’re dealing with.  I guess you’d have to get the gamers in here and ask them if they would want that to happen.  The second part of the follow-up is that I didn’t suggest that you selectively chose those.  I thought the fact that the percentages were not placed in 2002, which would show us going up, was kind of interesting. 

Chairman Collins:

Silver State and Republic are not the only recyclers, especially around gaming properties.  There’s a ton of recycling besides that.  I don’t know if that’s all counted.  I don’t know how much of that or how accurately that’s counted.  I have a question for you, too.  If that site in Lincoln County were in Clark County, would it have gotten where it did?  Would it have gotten to that mass?

 

Steve Kalish:

I don’t think so. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Is that because the state’s underfunded and not being able to police, or what?

 

Steve Kalish:

I don’t know if underfunding is a problem.  Certainly they came in under the guise of recycling, and I think they fooled everybody.  They continue to fool everybody, and they continue to operate illegally.  I think that eventually is going to be a major cleanup costing $10 million or $20 million dollars.

 

Chairman Collins:

Are they still dumping there or just hauling gravel out of there? 

 

Steve Kalish:

They are still dumping there today.

 

Chairman Collins:

That’s an ugly site.

 

Steve Kalish:

Republic and another company called RC Farms have collectively 250 to 300 people sorting garbage behind the hotels on the Strip.  We’re taking out food waste; we’re taking out tin cans.  You won’t see a more aggressive effort; I don’t think there is a city in this country that has that type of effort trying to reduce waste at hotels.  I think when you come down here you need to see that, because I don’t know of any other city in the country that has that type of program that’s effective.  Again, one of the things is that every year we tend to blow up a hotel down there—the Dunes, the Aladdin, the Desert Inn—and those volumes of waste will never be attacked by recycling.  That’s all going into APEX, and that’s going to bring down your recycling numbers. 

Chairman Collins:

I would add, too, that the benefits are that those casinos don’t buy as many tablecloths, spoons, forks, glasses, and dishes.  They can take back in-house and reuse what gets thrown away. 

 

Assemblyman Geddes:

I agree entirely with the casinos and what they’re doing, especially with RC Farms.  I think that is the perfect example of a program that works great and in which the casinos are getting a bang for their buck in recycling.  We need to encourage those wherever we can.  I guarantee that wasn’t making money when it first started.  It took a little while to get the bugs out of that program until they started making the money.  As long as it’s still permitted in Clark, it should be feasible, but once they force RC Farms out, it may not be.  I think it is a great program, and it’s an example of what we can do.  I want to encourage expansion beyond that. 

 

Ray Bacon, Private Citizen:

[Introduced himself and explained that he was not representing the Nevada Manufacturers Association today.]  One of the things that I think would make this bill better is if you take the compost material out of the issue, because paying tipping fees for something that’s going to be composted is ridiculous.  You want to encourage that as much as you possibly can.  We tend to use it for cover, instead of using it for compost, so if we have a composting operation, it shouldn’t have a tipping fee. 

 

Chairman Collins:

The facility in Lincoln County has access to all the compost material from the Hidden Valley Dairy it wants.  It just doesn’t haul enough of it over there to be legitimate recycling.

 

Jeanne Rucker, Washoe County District Health Department:

[Introduced herself.]  We are the solid waste management authority for both Washoe County and Storey County.  I’m here to oppose the bill.  My first point is that we have not been given information from the NDEP regarding the actual financial end of this bill.  We’ve got 30 cents a ton by my calculations for the waste that is disposed of.  In the Lockwood Regional Land Fill, it would reduce the amount of funding to Washoe County anywhere from $125,000 to $150,000 annually.  That money is what supports our solid waste management program, so we are very concerned about funding. 

 

Secondly, there was a statement that the 30 cents a ton would be charged to out-of-state waste haulers.  We currently get a fair amount of out-of-state waste coming to the Lockwood Regional Land Fill, and those waste generators are currently charged a fee by the district health department.  That fee goes back to our agency and does help us regulate those out-of-state waste generators.

 

Chairman Collins:

Is that a separate fee from the in-state fee?

 

Jeanne Rucker:

No.  We have fees for solid waste management systems.  The disposal company pays a fee for the various transfer sites, as well as for the landfill.  The only people who are exempt from those fees are recycling facilities and resource recovery facilities.  As an incentive to them to do what they’re doing, we don’t charge that fee. 

 

Another point that we are concerned about is the reporting of the recycling information directly to NDEP.  Washoe County does have a recycling coordinator.  That recycling coordinator is funded partially by the tire fund and 50 percent from local dollars.  That was a choice that Washoe County made, and I’m not sure in these tight fiscal times that it should be up to the state to be telling locals how they should set their service priorities.  In Washoe County we currently have that position.  Since we have that position, we’ve developed a number of good relationships with businesses in Washoe County who not only are recycling facilities, but also who are diverting waste from the landfill.  The reason that our recycling rate is what it is, is because we’ve gone out and tried to find that information.  I think there is probably a lot more recycling occurring in this state than what is being reported simply because no one is asking the questions. 

 

We would request that if this bill were to pass that, at least in Washoe County, the recycling facilities still be allowed to report directly to the local agency.  We’re happy to provide that and to routinely provide that information to NDEP.  There was some concern that Washoe County’s recycling rate last year was recorded at 29 percent.  We think one of the people who reported to us gave an error in the amount that they reported, which falsely drove that number up.  We still think we met the state goal of nearly 25 percent. 

 

Helen Foley, Legislative Advocate, Clark County Health District:

[Introduces herself.]  We share many of the concerns that Washoe County did.  However, we also have a major concern about the distribution of the tire fee and what would happen with the 30 cents if that fee were abolished.  Right now the state’s NDEP takes 40 cents; Clark County gets 30 cents; Washoe County gets 25 cents; and the Tax Department gets 5 cents.  That means that Clark County has 1.5 million people and all of the waste from the casinos, and we only get $0.05 more than Washoe County does.  We think that there’s a real inequity here when we are 3.5 times larger than they are.  It would be something that we would really like to have this Committee look into. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Is that the tire fee?

 

Helen Foley:

That’s the tire fee, but with this 30-cent fee, there’s no distribution mechanism, and we would assume that it would be the same.  They are silent on it. 

 

In 2002, Clark County Health District investigated 1,100 cases dealing with this.  That was up 700 from the previous year.  They worked very cooperatively, as Washoe County stated, with the major recyclers, but there’s an awful lot of illegal dumping that’s going on with construction firms and everyone under the guise of recycling, when they just illegally dump.  It is a major problem, but we don’t think that this is necessarily the way to fix it. 

 

Chairman Collins:

What’s the health department in Clark County doing about pulling over those vehicles that are doing that illegal dumping?  When they go up Highway 93 and turn left rather than turning right at the Alamo exit?  Do you do anything to them?

 

Helen Foley:

I certainly hope so.  I do not have an answer for you, but I can find out.

 

Dan Musgrove:

[Introduces himself again.]  I don’t have much more to add.  Mr. Kalish expressed most of the problems that we see in Clark County.  Obviously, this is a tax.  This is a tax that the County Commissioners and City Councilmen would have to impose on the residents of Clark County.  There isn’t any way to make it fair across the board, and we see that as a very big problem. 

 

Also the bill calls for development codes to require storage of recycling materials in large commercial office buildings and apartment complexes.  That is something that we never considered and never passed on to the building departments.  It would have to be developed.  The funding formula obviously is a concern.  Seventy percent of the population doesn’t recycle, and we have      35 million visitors a year; I think we’re generating some trash, but I don’t think we’re seeing the money back in Las Vegas.  I think for us to do the job, we need to look at equity.

 

Chairman Collins:

Anything that you testifiers would like us to consider for proposals, I would like submitted in writing, whether for or against the tire fee being increased rather than eliminated versus the tipping fee.  Since we are out of time, is there anyone who has a last word?  Does anyone want to do a subcommittee on this and try to see if there’s some action or some amendments that you want to work on?  [The Chairman appointed Assemblyman Conklin, Chairman of the Subcommittee, and Assemblyman Geddes, Assemblyman McCleary, and Assemblywoman Ohrenschall to serve on the Subcommittee.]  We’ll schedule a meeting and see if there’s something we can do with this bill.  Find out whether or not increasing the tire fee would be equitable and whether adjusting the formula would be a consideration.  Also, you need to address the recycling concerns.  [The Chairman asked Mr. Kalish and Mr. Musgrove to return to the table.]

 

You have recycling boxes around the schools, public buildings, and places like that.  Where do you not have recycling boxes?  Is it just the multifamily areas that are the biggest problem? 

 

Steve Kalish:

I think it’s important to know that 25 percent of the waste stream is residential, and we have a curbside program.  With those baskets, we have between 35 percent and 45 percent participation rate.  I think an important note is that senior citizens, who are a big part of our population in southern Nevada, may only put recyclables out once a month, but we’ll get 100 percent of what they’re putting out, because their waste stream is not as large.  Our biggest waste stream comes from hotels and the construction industry.  Those are very difficult recycling avenues.  Regarding the multifamily, we’ve tried 800 different apartment complexes.  I think we’re down to 200 or 300, and what happens is they wind up just using the white containers as waste containers.  When you get two that are good in a complex, and you empty two that have garbage in them, you have just contaminated the two good ones, and now you have contaminated the whole load.  That’s a very difficult “animal” to attack, the multifamily recycling. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Don’t those all go to your recycling place where you sort anyway? 

 

Steve Kalish:

Right now we have created a dirty line.  We’re bringing in garbage off those front loaders and running probably 400 to 500 tons of garbage through there to strip the cardboard out.

 

Tom Green:

We currently recycle everything:  commercial, residential, and apartments.  One of our biggest is grocery stores.  There are containers in every place that will allow them.  What happens in large buildings is you run out of areas to place these.  No matter what you do, you can’t recycle when there is limited space.  We’ve tried, as Mr. Kalish said, putting in special containers just for recycling.  They end up getting contaminated.  When the garbage dumpster is full, people throw their garbage in the recycling bin, and it contaminates the whole thing.  It’s been a real nightmare.  We still continue to do it, and we’ve even developed special types of containers for cardboard that only have small lids that you can only stick cardboard in.  Before, we used to get deerskins, and everything else.  Now we have tried to develop containers for it.  So we’re trying to provide a service for every possible entity in the city.  It just doesn’t work in all areas.

 

Chairman Collins:

In those businesses that offer security shredding equipment and disposal, they’re just going to your landfill, aren’t they?  They’re not really separating?

 

Steve Kalish:

One of the things I want to point out is that we have 1,700 containers behind businesses right now that are for cardboard—Seven-Eleven, Stop n Go, and Taco Bell.  In addition to that, we do offer document destruction that gets recycled.  We are shredding paper.  We also offer white paper recycling in all the schools in southern Nevada.  All of those programs and the hotel recycling are not legislated.  Those were done to try to attack the waste stream, but we are really having a hard time in multifamily complexes.  That is a major challenge because, as a developer, and I’m sure that’s what you will have sitting here next—a developer would have to give up space, which means they give up units, because they give up parking space.  Now they’ll be screaming.  Just trying to fit everybody’s needs in is a very difficult task that way. 

 

Chairman Collins:

That goes to influence local government in their zoning and building codes.

 

Steve Kalish:

I think, with future technology, there will be a “porph” that can take in garbage and strip out recyclables.  I think that’s years away, but that’s where we will be headed, because getting people to do this, especially in a transient community like we have, is very difficult. 

 

Tom Green:

As far as publicity in letting the people know, we send flyers to every new customer, we send refrigerator stickers reminding them of their recycling days, and, yearly, we send flyers asking people to recycle.  We do get the word to everybody to try to recycle.

 

Chairman Collins:

Good. 

 

Steve Kalish:

We do it on a quarterly basis.

 

Chairman Collins:

Would the Subcommittee like to report back by next Monday?  [Closed hearing on A.B. 447.  Opened hearing on A.B. 488.]

 

Assembly Bill 488:  Makes various changes concerning ditches. (BDR 48-1293)

 

Assemblyman John Carpenter, District No. 33 (Elko County and portions of Humboldt County):

[Introduced himself.]  A.B. 488 was introduced because we’ve been having some problems around Memorial and other areas where they’ve been filling up the irrigation ditches instead of keeping them open.  Where culverts were put in, they’ve been filling them up.  I need to get the state engineer involved, which the bill speaks to.  I have met with Hugh Richey, and we’re going to meet again so that we can hopefully get it passed this session, because we really need some help out there.  People have to understand, even though we have a state law that says that you cannot destroy those ditches, they are doing it.  We have to put some teeth into the law so that the DAs [District Attorneys] will take their responsibilities seriously.  We are working on it, and I’ll have it in a couple or three days for you.

 

Chairman Collins:

We’ll open our Wednesday meeting with your bill. 

 

Assemblyman Carpenter:

I have another commitment.  I can’t do it Wednesday. 

 

Chairman Collins:

Okay, Monday. 

 

Assemblyman Marvel:

Mr. Carpenter, have you had an opportunity to look over the amendments that Hugh Ricci provided?

Assemblyman Carpenter:

Yes.  We need just a little tweaking in it, but it’s not too bad.  I just need to meet with him.  He was down at the other water bill on stock watering so I’m going to try to get together with him tomorrow.

 

Chairman Collins:

You’ll be gone the whole Wednesday meeting?  [Received confirmation.]  If possible, let’s get your bill completed Wednesday with your amendment. 

 

[The Chairman recognized Tracy Taylor, Nevada Division of Water Resources.  He also received confirmation they would fix the bill and make it enforceable.]

 

We’ll do the bill first thing Wednesday.  The meeting is adjourned [at 3:39 p.m.]

 

 

 

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED:

 

 

 

                                                           

Sharee Gebhardt

Transcribing Secretary

 

APPROVED BY:

 

 

 

                                                                                         

Assemblyman Tom Collins, Chairman

 

 

DATE: