LANSING – Responding to a report released today showing Canadian and out-of-state garbage increased to 6.3 million tons in 2006, House Democrats announced a plan to attack the economics of the ever-growing trash trade by raising the paltry charge that trash companies pay to dump in Michigan.
"The problem of Canadian and out-of-state trash is getting worse, and that's because Michigan is a cheap place to dump," said State Representative Bob Constan (D-Dearborn Heights). "Attacking the economics of the trash trade is the only way to protect our land, air and water for generations to come. Michigan should be a magnet for jobs, not for trash."
Michigan's Department of Environmental Quality today said Canada and other states dumped 6.3 million tons of trash in our state in 2006, up from 6.2 million tons in 2005. Canadian and out-of-state trash now accounts for more than 30 percent of total waste landfilled in Michigan. In 1996, Canada and other states dumped only 1.9 million tons of trash, about 13 percent of trash landfilled in Michigan.
The House Democratic anti-trash plan will:
- Raise Michigan's dumping charge from 21 cents a ton – the lowest in the region – to $7.50 a ton, the highest in the nation.
- Ban new landfills and strictly limit the expansion of existing landfills until 2012.
- Return money from the new dumping charge – expected to total $170 million in the first year – to local communities to pay for roads, fire and police, and more recycling.
- Crack down on jurisdictions that send prohibited waste to Michigan, and make it easier to prosecute and punish repeat offenders with up to $10,000 in fines.
For more than four years, House Democrats have led the fight against Canadian and out-of-state trash and said a high dumping charge is the best weapon against imported garbage. The nation's largest importer of trash, Pennsylvania, slashed garbage imports after it raised its dumping charge to $7.25 a ton in 2002. In 2001, Pennsylvania took in 12.6 million tons of imported trash; in 2005, that amount plunged to 9.6 million tons.