House Panel Includes Pallone Language on Rail Trash Transfer Stations in Spending Bill
Washington, D.C. --- The House Appropriations Committee last night approved language authored by U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) that encourages the Surface Transportation Board (STB) to clarify that waste transfer stations on railroad properties should be subject to the same laws and regulations as other solid waste facilities. The language was added to a report that accompanies the Fiscal Year (FY) 2007 Transportation, Treasury, and Housing and Urban Development (TTHUD) Appropriations spending bill.
Pallone was able to insert language expressing the House Appropriations Committee's disapproval of the growing number of waste haulers and rail companies, including at least nine in New Jersey, who have sought to exploit a loophole in the Interstate Commerce Commission Termination Act (ICCTA) in order to construct and operate unregulated waste transfer and sorting facilities on railroad properties.
"This is an important step to make sure that companies don't try to put unregulated trash facilities in places like Red Bank," Pallone said. "It's another way of trying to protect public health and the rights of local communities to decide what will be built in their towns."
Under the ICCTA of 1995, the STB has exclusive jurisdiction over "transportation by rail carriers" and the ability to grant federal preemption of local or state laws that might impede such transportation.
Last month, in testimony before the House Transportation Committee's Railroads Subcommittee, Pallone said that while this makes sense in reference to interstate rail operations, "Congress intended such authority to extend only to transportation by rail, not to the operation of facilities that are merely sited next to rail operations or have a business connection to a rail company."
Pallone said there are at least nine railroad transfer facilities operating in New Jersey under supposed federal preemption -- one of which actually handles hazardous waste. Some of these companies have gone before the STB to seek federal preemption of a host of environmental and public health laws that apply to every other waste transfer facility.
In Pallone's district, Red Bank Recycling is preparing to take advantage of the possibility of an ICCTA preemption to move forward with a proposal to build a waste transfer station near rail lines in Red Bank. Pallone said that officials from the Borough of Red Bank, the County Solid Waste Advisory Council, and the state have all weighed in with his office expressing grave concerns about this proposal.
To ensure that this issue would be addressed in the FY 2007 TTHUD Appropriations spending bill, Pallone worked with U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), a member of the House Appropriations Committee. Pallone's language was inserted into an explanatory report accompanying the bill, which was passed by the committee Tuesday evening and is expected to come before the full House for a vote next week.