September 7th, 2016

Dear Milpitas Candidates for Mayor and City Council,

Milpitas residents have been suffering under Republic Services’ Newby Island operations for decades. Our city does not benefit from disposal tax revenue as it sits on San Jose land, but we are negatively impacted as Newby Island uses our city address and pollutes our environment.

Newby Island has grown from a local dump into one of California’s largest waste management facility, attracting waste streams not only from the Bay Area, but also from cities as far as Elk Grove, Merced and Clovis. Newby Island is now the largest and last active landfill along San Francisco Bay. Instead of following its original closure plan at 150ft height, Newby Island has applied to expand its landfill to an unprecedented 245ft height and operate beyond 2041.

To make matters worse, Republic Services has a monopoly of Milpitas garbage contract for over 30 years. Milpitas residents pay the highest garbage rate in Santa Clara County for unlimited collections while we bear the burden of pollution. Regulatory violations continue to occur and Newby Island operations have now raked in over 30+ violations (including 11 for public nuisance violations) in the past 1.5 years. Over 5367 odor complaints logged to BAAQMD (Bay Area Air Quality Management District) and the City, which is 100 times above CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) guidelines for odor threshold. Republic Services have been ignoring our pleas to suspend its expansion plan until odor is abated. It continues to lobby for landfill expansion permits and new long-term disposal contracts.

We urge you to take the following public stance against Republic Services in support of the 23,000+ residents who have signed “Stop Newby Island Expansion” petition:

1. Support Measure L because the City has done its due diligence in the entire Garbage Disposal/Collection process which was fair, competitive, and open. Voting YES on the Measure L would uphold the Milpitas City Council’s decision to award the disposal contract to Waste Management’s Guadalupe Landfill. Republic Services has held a 30-year monopoly of Milpitas garbage contracts. It did not submit a garbage disposal bid and now seeking to undermine the RFQ process costing the city an additional $58,000 to place this item on the ballot. Waste Management who won the disposal contract is the lowest qualifying bid and had demonstrated strong regulatory conformance with 50-years remaining landfill capacity.

2. Oppose the Newby Island Landfill expansion. This is just bad idea with excess landfill capacity remaining in the county, so there is no need to expand Newby Island Landfill and bring more garbage into a densely populated and environmentally sensitive area. An expansion is also counterintuitive to state mandates on recycling, composting and source reduction.We have low confidence in Republic Services based on their track record. They spent $27 millions in odor measures at their Sunshine Canyon Landfill in Southern California, and violations persist. This is evidence that a full-proof odor mitigation technology does not exist. We are extremely frustrated because other states have denied permits and ordered landfill closure as in the case of the Tullytown landfill which has a similar scenario where one city has the permitting jurisdiction, another city downwind bears the odor impact. North San Jose, Milpitas, Fremont residents deserve equitable protection, especially since Newby’s odor has been an on-going problem for decades.

3. Reject any campaign contribution by Republic Services. Republic Services works by deeply getting involved in local politics and preaching that they are not the dominant source of odor and is the only viable solution to Garbage Disposal and Collections services. We know from working with BAAQMD that their investigation has pinpointed Newby Island as the source for 90% of confirmed complaints in the area. The RFP process has shown that there are many many companies who would do business with Milpitas without causing pollution in our town.

4. Apply pressure on Republic Services to cleanup their facility. We need to apply pressure to Republic Services at all level of government local, state, and federal. We have escalated the problem to all regulatory agencies. They’ve done their investigations and uncovered violations. Improvements were made, but odor problem is persisting. Regulatory violations continue to occur and Newby Island operations have now raked over 30+ violations (including 11 for public nuisance violations) in the past 1.5 years. Unfortunately, the regulatory agencies have no fixed timeline for compliance and not ready to push administrative or legal actions. Small fines is chump change to multi-billion waste management companies. Residents’ livelihood is compromised in the name of corporate profits.

We hope that you will commit to cleaning up the dire situation in Milpitas from the pollution caused by Republic Services’ Newby Island Resource Recovery Park.

Sincerely,

Milpitas REACH (Residents for Environment And Community Harmony)

“Our goal is to encourage residents’ dialogue and collaboration to eliminate man-made sources of odor polluting Milpitas. Through our collective efforts, Newby Island expansion permit appeal decision was deferred 8 times pending a new odor study. We need your help to win the battle. Let’s reach out and reach up together towards better environment & communities. “

http://milpitas-odor.info

Join our us to Demand San Jose to Stop ALL Urban Landfill Expansions!

It is appalling that every single city around San Francisco Bay has closed down its landfills and yet, San Jose City continue to permit the growth of 5 landfills in environmentally sensitive locations, 4 of the 5 are within densely populated neighborhoods.

There are 8 public schools and about 100,000 people who work and live within 2 miles of Newby Island Resource Recovery Park which includes the largest bayfront landfill, largest recyclery and composting operation. Collectively, Newby Island has received 4000+ complaints and 32 Regulatory Violations from BAAQMD, LEA and RWQCB in the past 15 months. San Jose Planning Staff had acknowledged that the existing land uses are indeed incompatible.

Dear neighbors and friends,

We have reached a very critical juncture where 3 major decisions will be made on Republic Services’ Newby Island that affects your living environment. We call for your individual action to ensure citizen’s interest is not compromised. Show up & Speak Out!

If we don’t represent our concern in our own voice, then capitalists and lawyers will manipulate the legal and bureaucratic system to get a favorable decision that serves their interest without our voice being counted. Tell the decision makers your concerns are real and though you are represented at times by your city, community leaders or lawyers, that should not dilute your self-representation or be exploited.

Email your concerns to decision makers and show up at the following hearings:

1. Newby Island Class Action Settlement (1-12-CV-228591)
   Decision Maker: Judge Peter H Kirwan, pkirwan@scscourt.org
   Key Date: May 6, 2016 Fairness Hearing @ 9am, Superior Court, 191 N 1st St, San Jose

2. Newby Island Expansion Permit (PD14-014)
   Decision Maker: San Jose Planning Commission
   msyesney@gmail.com, ballardshiloh@gmail.com, nick@nickpham.com, Ed@Abelite.com, brian.ohalloran@att.net, sylvia.do@sanjoseca.gov, rebecca.bustos@sanjoseca.gov
   Key Date: Aug 24th 2016 @ 6:30pm, San Jose City Hall, 200 E Santa Clara St, San Jose

3. Milpitas City Long Term Garbage Contract Selection
   Decision Maker: Milpitas City Council
   jesteves@ci.milpitas.ca.gov, cmontano@ci.milpitas.ca.gov, dgiordano@ci.milpitas.ca.gov, gbarbadillo@ci.milpitas.ca.gov, mgrilli@ci.milpitas.ca.gov
   Key Date: Collections Bid presentation (April/May TBD), Contract Selection (June TBD)

It is only through residents’ collective voices that we can win the war against the environmental injustice inflicted on our community. Time is now to act to be heard individually and show up to bring the citizen power to action!

Recent developments are appended for your reference. Thank You for your support.

Background Info:

If you are new to this issue, Newby Island has impacted the quality of life in Milpitas, Fremont and San Jose for decades. 23,000+ residents have signed the “Stop Newby Island Landfill Expansion” petition. In 2015, Newby received 19 regulatory violations (9 for public nuisance) and accounted for 90% of confirmed odor complaints. In the first 3 months of 2016, Newby received 4 regulatory violations and 800+ complaints were logged. Despite recurring violations and public objections, Republic Services continue to pursue Newby Island expansion to an unprecedented height, solicit new long term garbage contracts and deny any wrongdoing (class action settlement). For more information, visit milpitas-odor.info or like us on Facebook.

Recent Developments:

Class Action Lawsuit Settlement

• 600+ opt-out vs 200+ opt-in claims out of 6,800 households by 2/9/16 deadline signified strong dissent over settlement terms and inadequate representation of class members
• 90+ letters from residents outside “1.5 miles radius” objected to the arbitrary class definition
• Suspicious addition of “Dawn Lepik” as a new named plaintiff on 3/16/16 “to protect the interest of the settlement class” after Dolly Wu (original plaintiff) confided to “not spend enough time to understand the facts and situation about the settlement”
• Deadline extension for claims only and denying absent class members’ rights to object or opt-out constitutes bad faith and conflict of interest
• Attorneys attempt to discredit high opt-outs as being influenced by misinformation

Newby Island Expansion Permit

• Recurring regulatory violations and odor complaints in 2015/16 signify on-going problems. It is against San Jose Municipal Code Section 20.100.940 to issue permit that has unacceptable negative effect on adjacent property or properties
• New odor study results will be revealed – Don’t miss it!

• Bylaws is being amended on 4/13/16 where only 3 affirmative votes are needed pass a motion for the permit hearing (compared to 4 in the original bylaws)

Milpitas City Long Term Garbage Contracts

• City is finalizing 2 separate new contracts: 20-year disposal contract (Part 1) and 10-year collection contract (Part 2)
• Part 1: On 3/15/16, City Council awarded the 20-year disposal contract to Guadalupe Landfill in San Jose based on the lowest competitive bid. For the 1st time in Milpitas’ history, its waste will not be disposed at Newby Island. However, Allied Waste (a subsidiary of Republic Services) has sponsored a referendum to overturn Milpitas City Council’s selection of Guadalupe Landfill
• Part 2: Republic Services are among 6 bidders for the collections contract worth $10+ million/year. Bids will be revealed and finalized by June 2016

Milpitas Residents,
Please beware of paid petition gatherers trying to overturn city council disposal contract decision. They’re using scare tactics (such as garbage rate hike) to solicit signature. In reality, the city council already selected the lowest bid.

Please alert your friends and neighbors to not sign this referendum.

It appears that the person collecting signatures is spreading false information. Please note that the city has not released any change to garbage fees since only the disposal contract was finalized (20% of cost) while collection contract (80% of cost) is still pending.

Specifically for disposal contract, the city council selected the lowest bid at $42.78/ton (i.e. Guadalupe Landfill in San Jose). City staff estimated that we are currently paying between $43-$50/ton to Newby. The consultant also revealed that San Jose City currently pays Newby $44.96/ton.

We are appalled that we have been paying higher than our neighboring cities all this while to smell their trash. We should support city council decision to go with the lowest bid and send our garbage to San Jose for a change.

Unfortunately Allied Waste is using paid signature gathers to acquiring enough votes to place a referendum on the ballot to allow the voters to overturn the City Council’s unanimous decision. Allied Waste has the ability to run an expensive campaign with misleading scare tactic messages. Allied Waste is a subsidiary of Republic Services.

Milpitas’ 30-year contract with Republic Services for garbage collection and disposal (landfill) ends in September 2017. City is currently finalizing 2 separate new contracts: a 10-year garbage collection and 20-year disposal contract.

On Tuesday March 14th, during the Milpitas City Council meeting, the residents of Milpitas has scored an important victory. The garbage disposal contract for the next 20 years was awarded to Waste Management Inc (Guadalupe landfill, San Jose). As residents of Milpitas, we’ll no longer bury our waste in our own backyard (Newby Island Landfill on Dixon Landing). Guadalupe landfill received 34 unconfirmed odor complaints in the last 2 years while Newby has about 3,000 complaints in Milpitas in the last 12 months.

We have sent a clear message to Republic Services (Newby Island Landfill’s operator) that having a landfill next to a residential area and environmentally sensitive wildlife refuge no longer provide them with a competitive advantage. We, the people, are standing up to defend our rights for clean air/water and we have the will and determination to continue fighting until the landfill has been closed.

Having a landfill at the doorstep of Milpitas did not help Republic Service to get the disposal (landfill) contract from Milpitas. Also having a landfill in the heart of Silicon Valley will hurt their garbage collection business as well.

Milpitas has started the evaluation process for the garbage collection 10 year contract valued at an estimated amount of $100M+. Shortlisting process has already started to narrow down from the current 6 bidders.

Please join our efforts of emailing City Council members to NOT AWARD THE GARBAGE COLLECTION CONTRACT TO REPUBLIC SERVICES as long as they pursue their landfill expansion permit which would raise the landfill’s height to an unprecedented 250 feet and extend the life of the landfill indefinitely.

Cut/Paste these email addresses and send your comments directly to the city council:

jesteves@ci.milpitas.ca.gov; cmontano@ci.milpitas.ca.gov; dgiordano@ci.milpitas.ca.gov; gbarbadillo@ci.milpitas.ca.gov; mgrilli@ci.milpitas.ca.gov

Every email counts.

The smelly Newby Island Landfill is a San Jose facility and under San Jose’s jurisdiction. Although Milpitas won’t be dumping its Garbage at Newby, other cities will still be using the facility, so it will remain open until it reaches capacity. If the expansion permit goes through, the landfill will be open for a very very long time.