ELR Citation: ELR 20041
No(s). 05-2024 (2d Cir. Feb 16, 2006)

The court holds that municipal flow control ordinances do not violate the dormant Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The municipal scheme at issue requires that the garbage generated by local households and businesses be delivered to facilities that are owned and operated by a public corporation, thereby preventing the trash from being processed at non-local facilities. After processing, the trash is then delivered by a private contractor to a designated landfill site, or is reused or recycled. The lower court held that the ordinances did not burden interstate commerce. But even if the ordinances were found to burden interstate commerce, any burden imposed by the ordinances is not clearly excessive in relation to the local benefits conferred by them. The lower court's judgment in favor of the defendants was therefore affirmed.

[A prior decision in this litigation is published at 31 ELR 20873.]