HB 1011

Compost and other products containing organic soil amendments infrastructure; Department of Environmental Quality tax policy options for reforming the litter tax study expanded; civil penalty. Allows a locality, by ordinance, to require certain generators, as defined in the bill, of large quantities of organic waste to separate the organic waste from other solid waste and ensure that the organic waste is diverted from final disposal in a refuse disposal system. The bill directs a locality that has adopted such ordinance to require a business generating at least one ton of organic waste weekly to compost such organic waste at a permitted facility if such facility is within 30 miles of the business. The bill allows a locality to establish civil penalties for violations of such ordinance but requires the locality to issue a warning to a generator that violates the ordinance prior to collecting such a civil penalty. The bill expresses that it is the intent of the General Assembly that new public school buildings and facilities and improvements and renovations to existing public school buildings and facilities include waste disposal infrastructure, as defined in the bill. Finally, the bill expands the study by the Department of Environmental Quality of tax policy options for reforming the litter tax to include (i) exploring options to expand state composting capacity and permitted facilities, school composting challenges and potential solutions, and incentivizing curbside residential composting and (ii) examining the impact of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, as defined in the bill.