Waste Connections Considers Moving to Texas

Date: September 1, 2011

Source: News Room

Waste Connections (Folsom, CA), in an apparent showdown with California governmental officials, is threatening to move to Texas. Waste Connections chairman and CEO Ron Mittelstaedt recently told the Sacramento Bee that his company has been negotiating with Texas officials to relocate its headquarters to Houston, Woodlands or Austin. Citing a tough "business climate" and a "dysfunctional" state Legislature, he said the company is frustrated with state lawmakers' attempts to thwart a bill that would allow its recently acquired Potrero Hills Landfill to accept out-of-county wastes. For Waste Connections, the demise of AB 1178 would make it difficult for the company to expand the landfill in Solano County, placing its $100 million investment at risk. The bill would have allowed the company to get around a voter-approved initiative known as Measure E that caps waste imports to Solano County landfills at 95,000 tons per year. AB 1178 would prohibit any city or county ordinance orvoter initiative from restricting or limiting the importation of waste into a privately owned facility in that city or county based on place of origin. Mittelstaedt said talks with Texas officials have been ongoing "for a while now" and that the state is offering incentives that could reduce the company's sales and property taxes as well as relocation assistance. By contrast, California lawmakers are "shoving businesses out," Mittelstaedt said.

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