A bill was filed last week to overhaul parts of Arkansas’ scrap-tire management, establishing a different system of scrap-tire fees and electronic monitoring of tire shipments.
House Bill 1267, filed by state Rep. Lanny Fite, R-Benton, has been filed before the Public Health, Welfare and Labor Committee of the House.
The bill is among the few dozen legislative priorities of Gov. Asa Hutchinson for 2017, and it comes more than a year after Fite first brought up issues he saw with the state’s waste-tire program with the joint House and Senate public health committees.
Fite said the bill would address the increasing financial strains on the state’s tire districts. He said three are in financial distress and more would be in distress by next year.
The state’s waste-tire program is operated by a dozen regional tire districts funded by the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality but locally operated. Funds are based in part on the population of the district’s coverage area and in part on the number of tires the district reports processing.
Waste tires have been an ongoing issue. Some districts have lost money on their programs, some have reported processing more tires than they’re selling, and others have been cited for having what constitutes an illegal tire dump on their property.
The bill would place a $3 rim fee on new tires and a $1 rim fee on used tires — meaning those fees would be charged every time a tire is placed on a car — beginning Jan. 1. Currently, $2 is charged per new passenger car tire and $5 is charged per new truck tire at the point of sale, which critics have noted leaves out used tires.
The bill also would establish an electronic manifest system that would track tire shipments. Tire dealers would have to register with the state and report how many tires they send to a district.
Critics of the state’s wastetire program have argued the program needs a way of seeing where tires are going to make sure tires aren’t being illegally dumped or that tire processing figures aren’t inflated in an effort to obtain more grant funds.
“It would provide better accountability and simplify reporting for the district, hopefully increasing the accuracy of the reporting we can receive,” said Becky Keogh, director of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, which also worked on the bill.
Keogh said changes to how a district’s waste-tire programs are funded also could provide incentives to districts to recycle tires rather than place them in a landfill.
The bill also would distribute funds based on the district’s method of tire disposal. If a district sends tires to a landfill or a monofill — an underground facility for storing tires — the district would get 75 cents per tire, with the amount adjusted for larger tires. A district that recycles or reuses tires would receive $1.25.
Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality tire disposition reports dating to 2008 have varied, with less than 50 percent recycled in 2013 and 70.5 percent recycled in 2009.
Michael Grappe, director of special programs at the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, described the bill earlier this month as a “transition bill” that addresses immediate problems but allows for wiggle room later.
Phil Jackson, director of the Carroll County Solid Waste Authority, and others said they would have preferred to see a tire fee charged on new cars. It’s better to charge fees on new cars — $10 to $12 in total — when owners register them instead of charging when tires are replaced, Jackson said.
“Otherwise, you’re retroactive and always going to be behind,” he said.
Fite had the opposite perspective. He said charging the scrap-tire fee at the time of sale would be like getting the disposal money in advance because the tire hadn’t been taken off of the car yet.
Wendy Bland, director of the Benton County Solid Waste District, and others said earlier this month they were excited about the electronic manifest system, although Bland’s tire coordinator, Jayme Land, noted many tire dealers don’t have computers and she has to mail them certain information.
Regional Recycling and Waste Reduction District waste tire coordinator Stacy Ford said on Friday that it was too early to comment on the bill. Ford’s solid waste district is Pulaski County, but it’s part of a nine-county tire district in central Arkansas that Ford helps manage.
“We don’t have a position on it yet because we don’t understand it well,” she said.
Ford said she plans to pose questions about the bill at theArkansas chapter of the Solid Waste Association of North America meeting Wednesday.
The County Judges’ Association of Arkansas also is expected to discuss the bill at its winter meeting next week in North Little Rock.