Thanks to no votes by our two newest supervisors, Shirlee Zane and Efren Carrillo, the sale of our landfill and solid waste system to Republic Services is off the table. That is great news, but now what? Or as posed by the 10/28 Press Democrat editorial, what next?
Here are the links to the most recent editorials, blogs, and articles:
Bleys W. Rose, 10/29/09: www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20091027/ARTICLES/910279961/1033/NEWS?Title=Supes-kill-landfill-deal Editorial Team 10/28/09: http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20091028/OPINION/910289924 Paul Gullixson: http://blog.pressdemocrat.com/insider/2009/10/surprising-vote-but-it-may-not-save-landfill.htm Doug Bosco: http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20091024/OPINION/910239931Well, there a quite a few of us in Sonoma County and the greater Bay Area who have pertinent ideas and I hope a grand dialogue begins soon. Many of these people and groups are already involved – the members of the Sonoma County AB 939 Local Task Force For Solid Waste and the Board of the Sonoma County Waste Management Agency. I plan to take part in these discussions and to showcase ideas here. I will post soon and invite you to do the same. If you have ideas you want to discuss with someone who is in the loop consider contacting one of the folks listed on these pages:
LTF: http://supervisors.sonoma-county.org/boards_and_commissions.aspx?sid=1001&bid=2&view=l Waste Management Agency: www.recyclenow.org/o_agency.htmlJanuary Workshop Series
LITE Initiatives and the California Resource Recovery Association are planning a landfill issues and zero waste workshop series for early January. Though we now need to rework the concept a tad, the general plan is still sound – a large evening event, followed by a four-hour morning or afternoon workshop and perhaps visits to city councils. A national landfill specialist has been invited to speak as well representatives of San Francisco’s Zero Waste Program and the California Integrated Waste Management Board.
The hard question is what dates and time would be best for our elected officials as well as staff and interested residents? I need to formally ask – soon!
The event planning process is complicated some by the fact that I am now in Cairo, Egypt attending an United Nations Habitat Program expert group meeting on draft book currently titled – Sustainable Solid Waste in Our World Cities. A co-author and the project data manager, I am working with waste specialists from all around the globe to highlight good, bad and interesting waste management strategies. Next week I will travel to Holland where the project team is based.
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