Ohio landfill zoning precedent

Ohio's First District Court of Appeals last Friday ruled that Colerain Township-based Rumpke Sanitary Landfill Inc. meets the guidelines set down by the state Supreme Court in 1992 for an entity to qualify as a public utility and is not subject to local zoning laws, enabling it – pending appeals -- to proceed with a planned $145.5 million expansion. It should be noted up-front that this was a zoning and not an environmental concern action. ( Opinion and Court's summary here )

"A challenge to a legislative enactment under the Ohio Constitution's 'one-subject rule' is a challenge to the authority of the General Assembly to enact that bill," the Court's summary said, "not a challenge to the statutory provisions of the bill itself… Secondly, a township is not a necessary party to a constitutional challenge to an enactment of the General Assembly under the one-subject rule." Section 15(D), Article II of the Ohio Constitution, provides that "No bill shall contain more than one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in its title." Rumpke had filed suit in Sept. 2008 seeking a declaratory judgment against provisions included in the state’s 2009-2010 omnibus bill that specify "privately owned solid waste facility does not fall within the definition of a 'public utility' under those statutes." ( Note: Constitutionality of ORC §303.211 and 519.211, regarding county and township zoning measures was being challenged. ORC §4905.03 and §5727.02 otherwise defines "public utilities" and "public utilities for tax purposes")

None the less "the decision is precedent-setting," Joe Trauth, Rumpke's attorney, was quoted in Sunday morning’s Cincinnati Enquirer "because this is the first time a solid waste landfill has been determined to be a public utility in the state of Ohio."

"A yard debris-only landfill in Northeast Ohio's Portage County," the article related, "tried for public utility status back in 1992 -- an attempt which failed after reaching the Ohio Supreme Court when public utility guidelines where laid down. Those guidelines, as the appeals court noted, require the business, among other things, to provide, 'an essential public service.'" (See A & B Refuse Disposers, Inc. v. Ravenna Twp. Bd. of Trustees, 1992-Ohio-23 here )

Friday's article also noted that "the expansion project would also increase the landfill's lifespan from 30 to 50 years. Mount Rumpke – so nicknamed because it is the highest point in Hamilton County – sits atop a former valley where the Rumpke family once raised pigs in the 1940s. The man-made mountain of garbage is the busiest landfill in Ohio."