South Carolina Again Considering Anti-Flow Control Bill

The South Carolina Senate is again considering a bill outlawing flow control in the state after a bill passed the House.

Senate Bill 203 currently is being reviewed by the Medical Affairs subcommittee for possible changes, says Mike Bessant, government affairs director with the Horry County Solid Waste Authority, in an interview.

Similar to House Bill 3290, the state Senate is considering the “Business Freedom to Choose Act,” which states that county ordinances that restrict or prohibit solid waste disposal at a permitted facility or impede the development or implementation of a recycling plan are inconsistent with state law and therefore void.

Bessant says several counties apply user fees that could be struck down as flow control. The bill also would restrict franchising, which Richland and Lexington counties in the state employ. The Three Rivers Solid Waste Authority in Aiken County has nine counties contracted to bring them waste, and that also could be restricted.
“We’re encouraged that they (Senate subcommittee) are willing to look at it, to make it less restrictive for counties in South Carolina,” he says.

In January the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina upheld the waste flow control law in Horry County, dismissing claims by Sandlands C&D LLC and its sister company Express Disposal Service LLC to overturn the ordinance, which directs all waste collected inside the county to the county landfill in Conway, S.C.

An anti-flow control bill died in the state legislature last year.