More city restaurants, supermarkets and food manufacturers would be required to compost their food scraps or face fines under a new City Council bill.
The legislation, sponsored by Manhattan Councilman Shaun Abreu, could lower the square footage threshold for eateries, shops and factories that must comply with an existing city program that mandates they compost organic waste. The bill does not specify the new potential square footage of businesses that would be affected. Instead, it asks the Department of Sanitation, which has indicated that it’s receptive to the idea, to identify new businesses that’ll have to hire a company to compost their food scraps. The legislation has alarmed some in the restaurant industry and is already drawing opposition.
Under a 2013 law, the Sanitation Department requires large food-related businesses to separate and dispose of their organic waste. That could be a restaurant with a floor area of at least 7,000 square feet, a supermarket occupying 10,000 square feet or more, or a catering company that hosts events attended by over 100 people, among other businesses. Such operations are required to arrange for their food scraps to be composted by paying a private company to do so. They also have the option to transport their own waste to a local processing site.
The initiative is part of the city’s strategy to combat climate change by keeping food scraps out of landfills where the refuse produces planet-warming methane gas. More than 1.8 million tons of commercial and residential organic waste is produced in the city each year, and requiring more businesses to compost more of that waste will “move our city toward a more sustainable future,” argued Abreu in a statement. His bill would require the Sanitation Department to expand the program by July 1, 2025. Five other Council members have signed on to the bill so far.
The lawmakers say that the initiative isn’t a particularly big lift. Typically, a private company will charge a business less than $100 per a ton of waste to cart away their compostable refuse. But if a business flouts the rules, the city gives an initial warning, followed by a $500 fine and an $1,000 fine for a third and any subsequent violations that occur in a 12-month period.
It’s those added costs and logistical considerations that has Andrew Rigie, the executive director of the NYC Hospitality Alliance, concerned for smaller restaurants that may soon have to comply with the program. Expanding the commercial composting rule, said Rigie, could make it “even harder and more frustrating to run a restaurant in New York.”
“It’s disappointing that the City Council introduced a sweeping composting mandate without first consulting the restaurant industry — especially when 86% of restaurants we surveyed say they lack the space or logistics to comply,” said Rigie, referring to a recent Alliance survey of roughly 500 restaurants and bars. “Composting is a worthy goal, but it should be a collaborative effort between small businesses and the city,” he added.
Other trade groups that represent city food manufacturers and retailers, such as The Food Industry Alliance of New York State and the Specialty Food Association, declined to comment on the proposed bill.
The Sanitation Department also declined to comment on the legislation. But during a March City Council budget hearing, Acting Sanitation Commissioner Javier Lojan effectively called for the Council to expand the commercial composting program because the initiative “is now substantially out of step with the city’s commitment to diversion of compostable waste” by targeting only certain businesses and not being more expansive with its criteria.
Lojan added that to make commercial composting more economically feasible the agency is in the process of implementing new rules that would require private carters to charge businesses less to collect recyclables and compost over trash. City businesses have traditionally paid companies to have their trash and recycles picked up while the city picks up residential refuse.
Meanwhile, since October, the city has required all residents to separate their food waste from other trash, and owners of properties with at least four apartments have had to set out bins for curbside collection.
The residential composting program is off to a strong start, with the Sanitation Department collecting a record 3.6 million pounds of organic waste during the second week of April. Despite that, the Adams administration said on Friday that it is pausing new fines to those who flout the law until at least the end of the year so that the city can increase its outreach to New Yorkers on how to properly set aside food scraps for collection.
