Testimony of Director of Climate Infrastructure Jamie Statter Before the New York City Council Committees on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management
Thank you Chair Nurse and to the Committee members for convening this hearing, considering this legislation, and providing me with the opportunity to testify today. My name is Jamie Statter and I am the Director of Climate Infrastructure in the New York City Comptroller’s Office.
Comptroller Lander has long been a leading advocate for scaling up our City’s zero waste efforts with robust, strategic, and sustainable approaches to sanitation. As the lead sponsor of the plastic bag fee/ban and styrofoam ban bills, a champion of implementing and expanding the City’s composting program, and an early sponsor of the Council’s waste equity and commercial waste zone legislation, the Comptroller understands the critical importance of these hard-fought wins and will continue to champion policies that set our City on a path towards sending zero waste to landfills by 2030. To that end, I want to thank the Council for introducing and hearing the critical pieces of legislation being heard here today – Comptroller Lander fully supports the full package of sanitation bills on the table for today: Intros 0274-2022 and 0275-2022 introduced by Council Member Nurse, Intro 0244-2022 sponsored by Council Member Hanif, and Intro 0280-2022 and 0281-2022 sponsored by Council Member Powers.
As the most populous city in the country, New York City’s efforts to build a more livable, sustainable, resilient, and just city are dependent on our ability to management waste and sanitation. Good government requires that we get the basics right, and nothing is more basic to urban life than waste management.
This spring, Comptroller Lander hosted town halls attended by more than 460 people across the city and conducted a survey to hear what New Yorkers have to say on sanitation We heard clearly that New Yorkers overwhelmingly want cleaner streets and organics composting. Nearly 60 percent of 3,000 survey respondents said that the cleanliness of their neighborhoods has gotten worse, citing overflowing street litter baskets and trash on sidewalks as top issues.
New Yorkers want—and deserve—better sanitation services in their neighborhoods. That’s why that thanks to leadership from Waste and Sanitation Committee chair Sandy Nurse, the Council won restorations to the Sanitation Department’s budget. But we cannot stop there.
Our City must continue to advance solutions that not only keep our neighborhoods clean, but make –real progress on our City’s commitments to mitigating climate change and improving equity. The bills you are considering today are critically needed steps towards a livable future for New Yorkers in two ways: first, by establishing accountability to the City’s zero waste commitments, and second, by providing more equitable and uniform access to composting and recycling.
The City’s stated waste commitments include sending zero waste to landfills by 2030 and reducing greenhouse gases via community and curbside compost collection.
As the Chief Accountability Officer of New York City, Comptroller Lander enthusiastically supports Intro 0274-2022 and Intro 0275-2022 sponsored by Council Member Nurse to ensure accountability in implementation of commitments. New Yorkers should hear regularly from the administration on its progress and efforts to achieve zero waste by 2030 and these bills establish a framework to hold the City accountable to those commitments.
Further, meeting the City’s zero waste commitment requires that the City expand – not contract – the collection of organic waste and recycling in our city. Two-thirds of survey respondents want organic waste collected and composted by the City. Organic waste is the most significant contributor of waste-related greenhouse gas emissions, representing over one-third of the city’s municipal waste. The overwhelming bulk of our organic materials are now sent to landfills or incinerators, typically located in overly burdened neighborhoods and communities of color. In landfills, organics generate methane – a very potent greenhouse gas. And when food waste or yard waste are sent to incinerators, they create additional air pollution impacting the health of surrounding communities. Instead, composting food scraps and yard waste can reduce pollution to our communities while producing agriculturally useful products and reducing methane emissions.
For these reasons, Comptroller Lander supports Intro 0244-2022 sponsored by Council Member Hanif to implement a citywide curbside organics program for residential buildings alongside Intro 0280-2022 and Intro 0281-2022 sponsored by Council Member Powers to expand the number of drop off locations for organic waste and recycling.
In 2018, New York City had the largest composting program in the nation, serving the five boroughs and 3.5 million people. These services were cut at the onset of the pandemic, but the climate crisis requires that we move forward not backward. Let us go back to leading in this important area. The people resoundingly want better sanitation services, and want composting to be a part of that mix.
Our office is proud to support the slate of bills you are considering today and aid in your efforts to effectively provide critical services to New Yorkers and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Thank you again for convening this important hearing and for the opportunity to work together to address climate change in an equitable and just fashion.
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