Section 27-0106 of the Environmental Conservation
Law defines the state's solid waste management policy, and § 27-0107
of such law sets forth the purpose and scope of local solid waste
management plans.
Section 226-b of the County Law provides in part that
a county may appropriate and expend such sums to "provide for the
separation, collection and management of solid waste in such county
and for that purpose may acquire, construct, operate and maintain
solid waste management facilities."
Section 120-aa of the General Municipal Law provides
in part that in accordance with the state policy on solid waste management,
a municipality adopt, on or before September 1, 1992, a local law
to require source separation and segregation of recyclable or reusable
materials from solid waste.
Section A7-4 of the Sullivan County Administrative Code provides that the Commissioner of Public Works shall have the power to formulate and implement a program for the collection and sanitary disposal of solid waste.
The Sullivan County Legislature assumed the lead role
in examining all alternatives for the disposal of solid waste within
Sullivan County, and the County Legislature did also accept the responsibility
of developing the most cost effective and environmentally safe solution
for the disposal of solid waste in Sullivan County.
The Public Works Committee has recommended a county-wide
recycling program which shall require the source separation of various
recyclable components of the solid waste stream. It is intended that
an expanded recycling program of additional materials shall be initiated
as the County of Sullivan gains experience and formalizes its recycling
procedures.
The County of Sullivan's goal is to reuse and to recycle
materials such as paper, glass, yard wastes, metals, plastics and
other recyclable materials which can be separated from nonrecyclable
wastes at the source, i.e., at the residence or at the nonresidence
where the waste is created. Such reduction and recycling of solid
waste is in keeping with the expressed policy of the State of New
York to save landfill space, reduce waste disposal problems and to
conserve our precious natural resources.
Mandatory recycling will be a new challenge to the
residents of Sullivan County, one to be learned and to be improved
upon. Education, participation and cooperation are the elements of
a successful recycling program, and when the county has a successful
recycling program operating, it will be a keystone in the management
of the Sullivan County Solid Waste Management Plan. The Sullivan County
Solid Waste Advisory Board is an integral part of the educational
and monitoring process of the program.
In connection with the effort by the County of Sullivan
to recycle a substantial component of its solid waste stream, the
County of Sullivan may also wish to accept recyclables that are generated
from outside of the county for the purposes of marketing the same
and obtaining the income generated thereby. Sullivan County recognizes
that, as an inevitable adjunct to accepting recyclables that are generated
outside of the County of Sullivan, a certain small percentage of that
which is brought into the County of Sullivan may actually be nonrecyclable.
The benefit to Sullivan County of the income generated by accepting
recyclables from outside of Sullivan County warrants the toleration
of the small percentage of nonrecyclables that inevitably accompany
recyclables (e.g., a bottle coated in a substance rendering a bottle
nonrecyclable, a nonrecyclable bottle or jar cap, etc.).
The solid waste fee authorized by New York State County Law §§ 226-b
and 266 and New York State Real Property Tax Law § 1501
is an access fee and is not a tax. However, said fee shall be collected,
enforced and corrected, as necessary, at the same time and in the
same manner as a real property tax. It is the intention of the Sullivan
County Legislature that the fee be billed to property owners simultaneously
with the annual County/town tax levy, on or about January 1 of each
year, and as such, shall constitute a real property lien on the affected
real property when levied, along with the rest of the tax bill. The
solid waste fee shall be collected initially by the local collector
as part and parcel of the tax bill and retained by said collector
as are other taxes or fees that are levied on a tax bill, until the
local collecting unit is made whole. Delinquent fees shall be collected
and enforced pursuant to New York State Real Property Tax Law Article
11, along with the delinquent taxes or other fees on the tax bill
on which the solid waste access fee is contained. In the event a solid
waste fee is required to be corrected, it shall be done so, as applicable,
by implementing the provisions of Real Property Tax Law Article 550
et seq. and treated as a correction of errors.
[Added 12-20-2012 by L.L. No. 6-2012]
This chapter may be cited as the "Sullivan County
Solid Waste Management Law of 1992."