The Coalition of the Swilling

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January 23, 2007

It's a Sanitation Snake Pit

...that would make Tony Soprano proud. Only it's not Newark ~ it's New Orleans, Nagin and another taxpayer mugging.
Now, budda bing ~ follow the bouncing garbage truck carefully, cher.

New Orleans officials traded a zoning waiver needed by Waste Management to operate the Chef Menteur Landfill for the promise of a portion of the landfill’s revenue, according to a federal audit that deems the deal inappropriate and concludes the city should pay the money back.

Because the federal government was paying 100 percent of the cost of debris removal, the report says, the city was in essence helping itself to an unauthorized federal grant. To cover the cost of paying the city, the landfill’s operators inflated their prices, which was in turn paid by the federal government.

As it turns out, the city hasn’t received any of the approximately $860,000 it is owed under its agreement with Waste Management, which opened the controversial and short-lived Chef Menteur Landfill in eastern New Orleans. But if it’s ever collected, the money should be treated “as a credit to be deducted from the city’s claim for other disaster costs,” said the report, conducted by the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Under the city’s agreement with Waste Management, signed by Mayor Ray Nagin in February 2006, the trash hauler promised to “donate” 22 percent of its revenues from the new construction landfill to the city. In a separate document, signed the same day, Nagin used his emergency powers to grant the company a six-month waiver from the city’s zoning law, allowing the landfill to open.

...“Common sense tells us that the beneficiary of a voluntary donation would not normally require the donor to (1) sign a notarized agreement; (2) submit calculation of donated amounts to the beneficiary for validation; or (3) continue donations so long as the donor operated a business that required the beneficiary’s authorization,” the report says. “These requirements provide convincing evidence that the landfill operator’s ‘donation’ of 22 percent of gross revenues was contingent on the city’s approval to operate the landfill.”

Damn. This whole time I thought Hizzoner was emulating someone else.
He needs to cut back on his cable.

Posted by tree hugging sister at January 23, 2007 10:44 PM

Comments

Posted by: Gunslinger at January 24, 2007 12:06 AM

Posted by: colin at January 24, 2007 12:57 AM