released<\/a>\u00a0a review\u00a0of the Department of Sanitation (DSNY)\u2019s implementation of the Commercial Waste Zones (CWZ) program developed by Local Law 199, a 2019 reform enacted to address safety, labor, and environmental risks in the notorious commercial waste removal industry. While the review finds that DSNY technically complied with the law, it identifies numerous failures to address key industry issues.<\/p>\n\u201cThe Adams Administration\u2019s rollout of Commercial Waste Zones raises serious concerns,\u201d said\u00a0Comptroller Brad Lander<\/strong>. \u201cBy awarding contracts to bad actors with terrible safety records, the Department of Sanitation is undermining the goals of the program.\u00a0The City must improve transparency and be willing to hold bad carters to higher standards to ensure this law actually improves the conditions for workers and our environment.\u201d<\/p>\nWhile DSNY itself collects waste from residents, for commercial businesses, the City manages a network of more than 90 private carting companies licensed to contract with and collect waste from businesses. Collectively, the City\u2019s commercial businesses generate more than 3 million tons of waste each year.<\/p>\n
For decades, the private carting industry operated in a disorganized, inefficient, and hazardous manner. Private garbage trucks crisscross the city collecting waste from businesses across long, overlapping routes. In some parts of the city, over 50 carters serve a single neighborhood; a single commercial block could see dozens of different private garbage trucks on a given night. The overlapping routes and high concentrations of trucks in a single area result in millions of excess truck miles each year, negatively impacting the city\u2019s air quality and public health.<\/p>\n
Local Law 199 gave DSNY the authority to reform the commercial waste industry by dividing the city into 20 \u201ccommercial waste zones,\u201d each served by up to three carting companies selected through a competitive process for ten-year terms.\u00a0New York City Business Integrity Commission (BIC) must license each carter. In January 2024, DSNY announced the selected carters and in September 2024 began implementation of the first Commercial Waste Zone. After environmental advocates, labor unions, and elected officials expressed concerns on the implementation of the CWZ program, Comptroller Lander launched the review into DSNY\u2019s carter selection.<\/p>\n
Auditors found that, despite following the letter of the law, the 18 carters selected by DSNY accumulated an average of 241 violations over a four-year period for traffic safety, hazardous waste disposal, and labor violations. Ultimately, DSNY chose eight of the ten carters with the worst safety records to participate in the CWZ program. One company alone, Action Carting Environmental Services Inc, received over 1,000 violations. Moreover, DSNY selected Cogent Waste Solutions to participate in the program, despite the company receiving $50 million in fines for violations issued by BIC. Cogent Waste Solutions\u2019 violations resulted in a $500,000 settlement, the highest-ever payout on record with BIC, for overcharging customers in close to 5,000 instances from March 2020 to December 2022.<\/p>\n
The Comptroller\u2019s review uncovered problems in the program\u2019s implementation:<\/p>\n
\n- Active litigation did not impact selection<\/strong>: 12 out of the 18 awarded carters faced some form of civil litigation. Two companies (Royal Waste and Action Carting) accounted for 60% of the pending cases.<\/li>\n
- Prices varied widely between and within zones, lacked transparency, and carters that scored highly on pricing were not necessarily awarded zones<\/strong>. The Comptroller\u2019s review confirmed that pricing was DSNY\u2019s most heavily weighted factor in reviewing proposals. However, carters\u2019 proposals did not explain how they derived pricing, with the maximum five-day monthly price that some carters could charge being at least 50% more than what other carters could charge within the same zone.<\/li>\n
- The weighting process may have disadvantaged smaller operators<\/strong>. DSNY awarded 4 companies (Action Carting, Waste Connections, MRT BWR, and Cogent) 70% of zone assignments. DSNY gave higher scores to proposals submitted by the larger carters.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
To improve implementation and transparency, Comptroller Lander\u2019s review recommends tracking key indicators like vehicle miles traveled and safety violations in the Mayor\u2019s Management Report. It also urges DSNY to investigate pricing discrepancies and closely monitor performers with major violation histories. While DSNY selected all carters for the Commercial Waste Zones program, full implementation will not be completed until 2027.\u00a0In the meantime, carters with fewer violations that were not selected by the City are shutting down. As the industry consolidates, the City faces a narrowing window to rebid contracts to more responsible operators before they exit the market.<\/p>\n
The Comptroller urged the City to consider interventions to ensure the program\u2019s success:<\/p>\n
Accelerate the rollout of Commercial Waste Zones<\/strong>\u00a0to achieve full implementation by 2026 rather than 2027.<\/p>\n\n- Make public the safety and zero waste plans<\/strong>\u00a0submitted by carters during the RFP process to hold them accountable, along with any customer education and training materials.<\/li>\n
- Grant DSNY additional enforcement authority\u00a0<\/strong>over carters, including an escalating violation structure where repeated safety, environmental, and labor infractions lead to higher fines and ultimately the loss of a carter\u2019s BIC license, where appropriate.<\/li>\n
- Require carters with the most serious safety, environmental, and labor records to pay DSNY a bond\u00a0<\/strong>to compensate victims in the event of future violations or legal infractions.<\/li>\n
- Explore the agency\u2019s ability to void and rebid contracts<\/strong>\u00a0with carters that fail to meet program requirements or are in violation of City, State or Federal law.<\/li>\n
- Open permitted marine transfer stations to commercial waste haulers<\/strong>\u00a0in order to reduce truck traffic and take advantage of underutilized capacity at these facilities.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\u201cI am frustrated by the current status of the CWZ program and disappointed in the slow rollout by DSNY,\u201d said\u00a0Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso<\/strong>. \u201cWhen I drafted the legislation enabling the CWZ program as a Council Member, it was intended to mitigate the harms caused by negligent carting companies. This report shows how far we still have to go to hold these companies accountable, and how urgently we must fully implement CWZ for the safety of New Yorkers. Thank you to Comptroller Brad Lander for highlighting these inequities. I look forward to continuing our work to make waste pickup safe and equitable across Brooklyn and the whole city.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cResolving the issues of concern raised by this audit will ensure that the Commercial Waste Zones program will deliver on its promise to create major improvements for the workers of this industry and the communities they serve, said\u00a0Daniel Wright, President of Teamsters Local 813<\/strong>. \u201cTeamsters Local 813 remains committed to its full and swift rollout.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cThe Comptroller\u2019s audit shows that we can and must do better in reforming a dangerous private waste industry. Commercial Waste Zones are the right tool to protect sanitation workers, lower truck pollution, and make our streets safer for workers and communities. A truly successful system that will yield the intended benefits of this program requires more transparency, holding carters with serious infractions accountable and speedier implementation of the law which the audit rightfully calls for,\u201d said\u00a0Jenille Scott, Climate Director at ALIGN.<\/strong><\/p>\n\u201cThe 2019 Commercial Waste Zone law presents the opportunity for once-in-a-generation reform to waste handling by restaurants, businesses, and industrial establishments in the nation\u2019s largest city.\u00a0 But, as Comptroller Lander\u2019s audit rightly highlights, success depends upon timely implementation that prioritizes screening out waste haulers with serious safety, labor, or environmental track records,\u201d said\u00a0Eric A. Goldstein, NYC Environment Director at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC)<\/strong><\/p>\n\u201cThe Comptroller\u2019s audit confirms our suspicions that the intent of the Commercial Waste Zones to address environmental injustices and improve safety was not at the forefront of the DSNY\u2019s considerations.\u201d said\u00a0Eddie Bautista, Executive Director of NYC Environmental Justice Alliance<\/strong>. \u201cEnvironmental justice communities have long awaited the shift from truck waste export to marine and rail to alleviate the harms it imposes on our communities, yet these other stations remain grossly underutilized and largely excluded from the CWZ program.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cComptroller Lander\u2019s audit affirms that an unsafe and polluting waste management system cannot be reformed with a piecemeal approach,\u201d said\u00a0Justin Wood, Director of Policy at New York Lawyers for the Public Interest<\/strong>. \u201cThe Commercial Waste Zones system remains the only way to simultaneously improve conditions for workers, communities, the environment, and small businesses.\u00a0 Achieving the intent of Local Law 199 will require faster citywide implementation, rigorous enforcement by DSNY and other agencies, and increased transparency.\u201d\u00a0\u201cThe Comptroller\u2019s audit confirms our suspicions that the intent of the Commercial Waste Zones to address environmental injustices and improve safety was not at the forefront of the DSNY\u2019s considerations.\u201d<\/p>\n###<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 17, 2025 Comptroller Lander\u2019s review calls for stronger oversight and transparency to achieve the safety, labor, and…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":109714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-234257","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-city","11":"tag-newyork","12":"tag-newyorkcity","13":"tag-ny","14":"tag-nyc","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-united-states-of-america","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","19":"tag-us","20":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115220648382000533","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234257","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234257"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234257\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}