CSHB 392(L&C) am -SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT AUTHORITIES  CHAIR CON BUNDE announced CSHB 392(L&C) am to be up for consideration. REPRESENTATIVE PEGGY WILSON, sponsor of HB 392, introduced her staff to comment on the bill. REBECCA ROONEY, staff to Representative Wilson, explained that each Alaskan produces about 6.6 to 7 pounds of solid waste a day, which amounts to 90 tons per year in Southeast Alaska. Many waste-to-energy plants and incinerators have closed over the past 10 years. Some communities have resorted to shipping by barge to the Lower 48 super landfills. Recycling and solid waste disposal is expensive here and people pay between $77 and $200 per ton to ship solid wastes south while Anchorage pays only $40 a ton. HB 392 would provide a way for communities to come together to form an authority to do what no one community has been able to do. Working together, they can create economies of scale, reduce administrative costs and afford a state-of-the- art processing facility. The authority would also help the region's economy by keeping jobs in Southeast. Several communities have agreed to be part of the Solid Waste Authority. Upon formation it would decide on where the facility will be and what technologies would be used. It could include things like material recovery or recycling, state-of-the-art landfills, thermal reduction or waste-to-energy type processing plants, space for composting and a way to treat oily soils. The bill is modeled after the Port Authority and requires that each municipality's voters approve joining it. The Authority has an independent legal existence from the municipalities and the state. It may issue bonds, enter into contracts and borrow money. The board would be responsible for creating by-laws and regulations that would govern the authority and each municipality would representation on the board. It would allow a municipality to withdraw from the authority without dissolving it. However, the withdrawing municipality would remain liable for existing obligations to the authority or the other participating municipalities. 2:44:56 PM The Southeast Conference has been spearheading this effort for several years and they have secured funds for three separate studies. The first study was a recommendation on what was the best entity or vehicle to use to create this authority. The authority model is used most often in the Lower 48 and that is what was recommended to Southeast Conference. The second study provided language that is used in HB 392. The third study has not been delivered yet, but they are looking at the different technologies available for this management. The Authority would ultimately decide what kind of technologies to implement. It would also provide data that would be used to make sure that operations are financially feasible. CHAIR BUNDE said this would put government in competition with a private entity that ran a solid waste enterprise and asked if she had heard opposition to this bill from them. MS. ROONEY replied no; the only private entity that has come to her is the Juneau Waste Management Facility and it wanted to be a bidder. 2:46:08 PM CINDY ROBERTS, Liaison to the Denali Commission, Department of Commerce, Community & Economic Development (DCCED) said her interaction with this legislation is that the Commission was one of the funders of the original study that looked at the type of vehicle that would be best suited to put together these authorities. She said the Department is very pleased to endorse HB 392. 2:49:06 PM ROB ALLEN, Interim Executive Director, Southeast Conference, said it has been working on bringing communities together on this issue for several years. We see this as a mechanism to take care of solid waste in a better manner than we are now. We have good expectations of this being successful and being able to get more into recycling, as well, by bringing a lot more volume of material. So we see it on several levels as being very good for the region with a lot of potential, then, throughout the rest of Alaska if we're successful. 2:50:05 PM at ease 2:52:38 PM SENATOR SEEKINS moved to pass CSHB 392(L&C) am from committee with individual recommendations and attached fiscal note(s). Senators Ben Stevens, Davis, Seekins and Chair Bunde voted yea; and CSHB 392(L&C) am moved from committee.