Committee on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management Oversight – Waste Equity and Environmental Justice

Thank you to Chair Sanchez and members of the committee for holding an oversight hearing on waste equity and environmental justice. These issues are personal for BP Reynoso, having grown up in Williamsburg’s Southside, directly impacted by the dangerous streets and dirty air from hundreds of waste trucks going to and from the area’s many waste transfer stations daily.  

In 2018, the City Council passed Borough President Reynoso’s Waste Equity legislation, decreasing the amount of permitted waste capacity in three overburdened communities: North Brooklyn, the South Bronx, and Southeast Queens. According to DSNY’s 2026 Draft Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP), this “resulted in a decrease in material managed at affected private transfer stations by nearly 3,000 tons per day.” (That is equivalent to about 214 fewer private waste trucks in these communities daily.) However, due to the legacy of environmental racism and our city’s continued rezoning of manufacturing land for residential use, concentration of waste facilities in only a few communities remains an issue.  

To deliver environmental justice for these neighborhoods, as well as for communities outside the city where we send our trash, we must continue efforts to reduce waste trucks on our streets and decrease the amount of waste we send to landfills. Only one bill on today’s agenda, Intro 041, contributes to this effort by providing New Yorkers with an option to separate their organic waste when they are on the go, helping keep food waste out of landfills.  

However, the Council has already heard two other key bills that could make a meaningful impact on waste equity and environmental justice, and now needs to pass them:  

1. Intro 367, sponsored by Council Member Nurse, would require the City to create a plan to receive commercial waste at the Marine Transfer Stations (MTSs). The MTSs export waste by barge rather than by long-haul truck, significantly reducing vehicle miles traveled within the city. The 2006 SWMP proposed allowing this; however, 20 years later, despite ongoing advocacy from environmental justice communities, DSNY still does not allow it. The more waste we can send to these facilities, the fewer dangerous and polluting long-haul trucks on our streets. Additionally, because the MTSs are operated by DSNY, they don’t raise the usual concerns with private facilities, such as lack of compliance with maintenance regulations and worker protections.  

2. Intro 369, also sponsored by Council Member Nurse, would require DSNY to establish traditional composting facilities in each borough. The curbside organics collection program utilizes anaerobic co-digestion with wastewater at the Newtown Creek Wastewater Recovery Facility (WRRF). DSNY must address the environmental justice implications of concentrating its organics processing in Brooklyn Community District 1, which already has the highest permitted waste processing capacity of any community district citywide. The Waste Equity law included an exemption for recycling and organics; however, large-scale co-digestion of organics at wastewater recovery facilities was not envisioned at the time. Analysis in our report Expanding Composting in New York City: The Case for Passing and Implementing Intro-0369-2026 indicates that DSNY’s plans to scale-up co-digestion could add approximately 40 more trucks per day to the streets in CD1, undermining the goals of the Waste Equity law. As participation in the curbside organics collection program increases, DSNY should instead identify sites within the five boroughs to process organics through traditional composting methods. Composting locally has economic benefits for our communities and avoids the pitfalls of anaerobic co-digestion, which can create increased emissions and toxic byproducts.   

The Council should also consider other policies that divert waste from landfills and reduce truck traffic, including:  

• Pass Intro 256, sponsored by Council Member Hudson, which would increase textile recycling;   

• Speed up full implementation of Commercial Waste Zones (CWZ);   

• Expand recycling and reuse in construction and demolition;   

• Support outreach to ensure compliance with the curbside organics program;   

• Explore creative options to encourage materials reuse and a circular economy.  

Thank you again for holding this hearing and drawing attention to this important issue. Borough President Reynoso will continue to be a partner in delivering waste equity and environmental justice for New Yorkers.  

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