Local Government Recycling Program and Infrastructure Funding and Financing Mechanisms

Local Sources of Funding and Financing

• Local disposal tipping fees provide funding for diversion programs administered by CalRecycle and local jurisdictions. Tipping fees are generally used to fund daily operational and closure costs of a landfill but may also be used to fund recycling programs, litter abatement, public education efforts, and other programs.
  • A local tipping fee can encourage certain practices or discourage others.
  • For example, the disposal tipping fee for compostable organic materials can be set at a much higher rate than that set by the composting facility. This would act as an incentive for haulers to bring these materials to a compost facility rather than a landfill.
• Landfill Tipping Fees in California, a 60-page CalRecycle report, discusses complexity and variation in local, regional, and statewide landfill tipping fees based on posted “self-haul” rates and compares California to other states and the European Union.
  • Comparisons are made for both MSW and green waste fees.
  • The report also provides spatial analysis for California MSW tipping fee data by region and by:
    • Ownership (public/private)
    • Disposal tonnage
    • Rural/urban location and
    • Proximity to other landfills. 
• Differential fee structures can be used to incentivize products and manufacturing processes.
• The Institute for Local Government, CalRecycle, and advisory committee members from throughout the solid waste industry published:
  • Financing Recycling Programs and Facilities: Understanding Options and Resources
    • This document offers an overview of the current methods that local agencies use to fund their recycling programs and how the public and private sectors are financing recycling facilities. 
  • Connecting the Dots: Recycling Climate and Economic Development
    • This discusses how increasing recycling can reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and how creating facilities for recycling and the use of recycling materials will promote economic development.
  • These documents, and others, are available at ILG’s Recycling Resource Center, which also includes many resources, webinars, and case stories to help local governments finance and site recycling projects and programs in their community.
    • Other topics include anaerobic digestion, permitting requirements, and CEQA compliance.
• As part of the informal rulemaking process for SB 1383 (Lara, Chapter 395, Statutes of 2016) Short-Lived Climate Pollutants (SLCP), the October 30, 2017 workshop included a panel of speakers addressing funding programs and rate increases.
  • Watch a YouTube video of the recorded webcast (the discussion on this topic begins at 1:50:00)
    • Review a PDF of the slides in the first presentation given by Rob Hilton of HF&H Consultants. 
    • Transcript, using Microsoft Indexer (From the top left menu choose “Timeline”, from top right menu choose “View”, and then “Accessibility” to see the transcript).

Where to Go for Help

If you have additional questions about these topics, please contact local assistance staff.