HomeMy WebLinkAboutReso 136-2024 (24-878)
September 12, 2024
Hon. Amarra A. Lee
Judge of the Superior Court
c/o Bianca Fasuescu
Hall of Justice
400 County Center; 2nd Floor
Redwood City, CA 94063-1655
Subject: Response to 2023-2024 Grand Jury July 11, 2024 report, “The State of Compost
Compliance in San Mateo County”
Thank you for the opportunity to review and provide feedback on the Grand Jury's findings. This
letter serves as the official response from the City of South San Francisco to the findings and
recommendations outlined in the report. Please be advised that this response was approved by the
South San Francisco City Council during its meeting on September 11, 2024.
FINDINGS
F1. High green cart enrollment costs and insufficient bin space are the dominant contributors to
low participation rates among multi-family dwellings and businesses.
Response to F1 - The City disagrees with this Finding. The City and SSF Scavenger work
with multi-family dwellings and businesses on waste analysis to determine reduced size of grey
cart for landfill if green bin is added, therefore reducing the cost and ensuring compliance with SB
1383 requirements. Regarding insufficient cart space, there is an option to waive green cart
enrollment with a Physical Space Waiver for accounts that demonstrate that the premises lacks
adequate space for the collection containers; the City of South San Francisco has issued 20
Physical Space waivers.
F2. Green bin contamination among compliant multi-family dwellings and businesses prevents
them from diverting more organic waste.
Response to F2 - The City agrees with this Finding; correct sorting at the source does
maximize diversion. If there is significant contamination, the cart/bin is tagged and not serviced,
which encourages re-sorting at the source. In the case of minimal contamination, our hauler’s de-
packaging system can assist in extracting organic materials.
CITY COUNCIL 2024
JAMES COLEMAN, MAYOR (DIST. 4)
EDDIE FLORES, VICE MAYOR (DIST. 5)
MARK ADDIEGO, MEMBER (DIST. 1)
FLOR NICOLAS, MEMBER (DIST. 3)
MARK NAGALES, MEMBER (DIST. 2)
SHARON RANALS, CITY MANAGER
F3. City, County, and RethinkWaste compliance outreach efforts for multi-family dwellings and
businesses could improve because a significant portion of these properties remain non-compliant.
Response to F3 - The City agrees with this Finding. Extensive outreach (such as phone
calls, multi-lingual letters, site visits, instructional signs, tote bags, kitchen pails, recycling guides,
newsletters, social media campaigns and in-person training sessions) has previously been
conducted and is ongoing. The City can increase enforcement at this point.
F4. Multi-family dwellings and businesses produce a significant amount of the County’s organic
waste.
Response to F4 - The City agrees with this Finding.
F5. Citizens cannot conveniently access reliable diversion and participation rates because JPAs
and cities do not make the information available on their government websites.
Response to F5 - The City agrees with this Finding. As far as staff are aware, there is no
requirement from CalRecycle for jurisdictions to provide this information; we are awaiting
confirmation from their staff. CalRecycle’s website provides jurisdictional data including
diversion rates. If the City had received requests for diversion and participation rates by citizens,
the City would have provided the data to them. We will make data available on City website per
R4 below.
F6. Assessing progress on organic waste diversion in Atherton, Brisbane, Millbrae, Pacifica, San
Bruno, South San Francisco, and Woodside is difficult because they and their haulers do not
separate waste tons by property type on their annual or quarterly reports.
Response to F6 - The City partially disagrees with this Finding. Progress can be assessed
in different ways. As far as we are aware, CalRecycle does not require reporting by property type;
we are awaiting confirmation from their staff. The hauler tracks progress using lid flipping to
monitor contamination levels, participation rates across the entire customer base, and overall
diversion by tonnage across all waste streams.
F7. An alternate and reliable method to separating waste tons by property type would be analyzing
contamination statistics from route audits and waste evaluations.
Response to F7 - The City agrees with this Finding. Lid flipping has been the primary way
to identify contamination. Our hauler is currently sampling organic waste streams for
contamination, and they follow up with any generators that have contamination.
F8. Brisbane, South San Francisco, and Millbrae cannot properly track their waste trends since
their hauler and contractor have contradictory diversion rate formulas and tonnage measurements.
Response to F8 - The City disagrees with this Finding. The methodology of calculating
diversion rate as reported in the EAR (Electronic Annual Report) is as required by the State of
California and has been used consistently so trends over time can be observed. The tonnage the
hauler collects and diverts feeds into the jurisdiction diversion rate calculated in the EAR. Since
the Grand Jury used a completely different formula, it is to be expected that they would have a
different result.
RECOMMENDATIONS
R1. Beginning March 1, 2025, cities, the County, and RethinkWaste should host regular inperson
green cart enrollment summits for non-compliant businesses and multi-family dwellings, and
identify other new compliance strategies.
Response to R1 - The recommendation will not be implemented. The hauler already goes
directly to the generators site to make hands-on recommendations and provide education.
R2. Beginning January 1, 2025, Brisbane, South San Francisco, and Millbrae should investigate
their Electronic Annual Report contractor’s diversion rate conversion formulas and their hauler’s
waste scales.
Response to R2 - The recommendation has been implemented. It has been verified that the
haulers scales are accurate.
R3. By July 1, 2025, Brisbane, South San Francisco, and Millbrae should begin using the simpler
diversion rate calculation the report mentioned or develop a contingency plan if their hauler’s
scales are inaccurate.
Response to R3 - The recommendation has been implemented. It has been verified that the
haulers scales are accurate.
R4. Beginning November 30, 2024, cities should publish quarterly or annual waste reports with
diversion and participation rates on their government websites.
Response to R4 - The recommendation will be implemented. The City will post annual
diversion and participation rates from our Electronic Annual Report required by CalRecycle on the
City’s website by November 30 each year.
R5. Beginning December 31, 2024, cities should separate waste tons and diversion rates into the
three (or two) property types (business, residential, multi-family) in their annual or quarterly
reports.
Response to R5 - The recommendation will not be implemented. All waste generators that
are non-compliant or contaminate waste streams are targeted individually. If data was to be split
into categories there is a significant grey area in making the determination between commercial
vs. multifamily vs. residential. For example, mixed-use properties with retail on the ground floor
and housing above.
R6. Starting April 1, 2025, cities that cannot separate waste tons and diversion rates by property
type should conduct waste evaluations on highly contaminated routes more often.
Response to R6 - The recommendation has been implemented. The hauler conducts waste
reviews and revisits problem addresses. The hauler has found commercial front load bins for
organics and recycling to be most problematic and therefore has focused on this type.
R7. Starting May 1, 2025, cities that cannot separate waste tons and diversion rates by property
type should analyze problematic routes’ past and present contamination trends to track their
progress.
Response to R7 - This recommendation has yet to be implemented but will be implemented
in the future. The City will work with its hauler to analyze problematic routes’ past and present
contamination trends to track their progress starting May 1, 2025 or earlier.
R8. By February 1, 2025, jurisdictions should develop and implement new ways to make green
bins usable in multi-family dwellings’ and businesses’ narrow or small waste enclosures.
Response to R8 - This recommendation has been implemented. The hauler provides
various sized bins for organic waste, including various sized carts (32gal - 96gal) and front-end
load style (1yd - 4yd). For multi-family dwellings, the City and hauler also provide small kitchen
pails to help with transport of organic waste to make the green bins more usable.
Please reach me at (650) 877-8502 if there are any questions regarding this matter.
Sincerely,
Sharon K. Ranals
City Manager
Cc: Grand Jury email (sent via email to [email protected])
South San Francisco City Clerk