(1) Any person who handles, purchases, receives, recovers, sells, or is an end user of recovered materials or post-use polymers shall annually certify to the department on forms provided by the department. The department may by rule exempt from this requirement generators of recovered materials or post-use polymers; persons who handle or sell recovered materials or post-use polymers as an activity which is incidental to the normal primary business activities of that person; or persons who handle, purchase, receive, recover, sell, or are end users of recovered materials or post-use polymers in small quantities as defined by the department. The department shall adopt rules for the certification of and reporting by such persons and shall establish criteria for revocation of such certification. Such rules shall be designed to elicit, at a minimum, the amount and types of recovered materials or post-use polymers handled by registrants, and the amount and disposal site, or name of person with whom such disposal was arranged, of any solid waste generated by such facility. By February 1 of each year, registrants shall report all required information to the department and to all counties from which it received materials. Such rules may provide for the department to conduct periodic inspections. The department may charge a fee of up to $50 for each registration, which shall be deposited into the Solid Waste Management Trust Fund for implementation of the program.
(2) Except as otherwise provided in this section or pursuant to a special act in effect on or before January 1, 1993, a local government may not require a commercial establishment that generates source-separated recovered materials to sell or otherwise convey its recovered materials to the local government or to a facility designated by the local government, nor may the local government restrict such a generator’s right to sell or otherwise convey such recovered materials to any properly certified recovered materials dealer who has satisfied the requirements of this section. A local government may not enact any ordinance that prevents such a dealer from entering into a contract with a commercial establishment to purchase, collect, transport, process, or receive source-separated recovered materials.

(a) The local government may require that the recovered materials generated at the commercial establishment be source separated at the premises of the commercial establishment.

Terms Used In Florida Statutes 403.7046

  • Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
  • Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
  • Department: means the Department of Environmental Protection or any successor agency performing a like function. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Disposal: means the discharge, deposit, injection, dumping, spilling, leaking, or placing of any solid waste or hazardous waste into or upon any land or water so that such solid waste or hazardous waste or any constituent thereof may enter other lands or be emitted into the air or discharged into any waters, including groundwaters, or otherwise enter the environment. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Evidence: Information presented in testimony or in documents that is used to persuade the fact finder (judge or jury) to decide the case for one side or the other.
  • Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
  • Person: means any and all persons, natural or artificial, including any individual, firm, or association; any municipal or private corporation organized or existing under the laws of this state or any other state; any county of this state; and any governmental agency of this state or the Federal Government. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Processing: means any technique designed to change the physical, chemical, or biological character or composition of any solid waste so as to render it safe for transport; amenable to recovery, storage, or recycling; safe for disposal; or reduced in volume or concentration. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Pyrolysis: means a process through which post-use polymers are heated in the absence of oxygen until melted and thermally decomposed, and then cooled, condensed, and converted to any of the following:
    (a) Crude oil, diesel, gasoline, home heating oil, or another fuel. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Pyrolysis facility: means a facility that receives, separates, stores, and converts post-use polymers, using gasification or pyrolysis. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Recovered materials: means metal, paper, glass, plastic, textile, or rubber materials that have known recycling potential, can be feasibly recycled, and have been diverted and source separated or have been removed from the solid waste stream for sale, use, or reuse as raw materials, whether or not the materials require subsequent processing or separation from each other, but the term does not include materials destined for any use that constitutes disposal. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Recovered materials processing facility: means a facility engaged solely in the storage, processing, resale, or reuse of recovered materials. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Solid waste: means sludge unregulated under the federal Clean Water Act or Clean Air Act, sludge from a waste treatment works, water supply treatment plant, or air pollution control facility, or garbage, rubbish, refuse, special waste, or other discarded material, including solid, liquid, semisolid, or contained gaseous material resulting from domestic, industrial, commercial, mining, agricultural, or governmental operations. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Solid waste disposal facility: means any solid waste management facility that is the final resting place for solid waste, including landfills and incineration facilities that produce ash from the process of incinerating municipal solid waste. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Solid waste management: means the process by which solid waste is collected, transported, stored, separated, processed, or disposed of in any other way according to an orderly, purposeful, and planned program, which includes closure. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Source separated: means that the recovered materials are separated from solid waste at the location where the recovered materials and solid waste are generated. See Florida Statutes 403.703
  • Transport: means the movement of hazardous waste from the point of generation or point of entry into the state to any offsite intermediate points and to the point of offsite ultimate disposal, storage, treatment, or exit from the state. See Florida Statutes 403.703
(b) Before engaging in business within the jurisdiction of the local government, a recovered materials dealer or pyrolysis facility must provide the local government with a copy of the certification provided for in this section. In addition, the local government may establish a registration process whereby a recovered materials dealer or pyrolysis facility must register with the local government before engaging in business within the jurisdiction of the local government. Such registration process is limited to requiring the dealer or pyrolysis facility to register its name, including the owner or operator of the dealer or pyrolysis facility, and, if the dealer or pyrolysis facility is a business entity, its general or limited partners, its corporate officers and directors, its permanent place of business, evidence of its certification under this section, and a certification that the recovered materials or post-use polymers will be processed at a recovered materials processing facility or pyrolysis facility satisfying the requirements of this section. The local government may not use the information provided in the registration application to compete unfairly with the recovered materials dealer until 90 days after receipt of the application. All counties, and municipalities whose population exceeds 35,000 according to the population estimates determined pursuant to s. 186.901, may establish a reporting process that must be limited to the regulations, reporting format, and reporting frequency established by the department pursuant to this section, which must, at a minimum, include requiring the dealer or pyrolysis facility to identify the types and approximate amount of recovered materials or post-use polymers collected, recycled, or reused during the reporting period; the approximate percentage of recovered materials or post-use polymers reused, stored, or delivered to a recovered materials processing facility or pyrolysis facility or disposed of in a solid waste disposal facility; and the locations where any recovered materials or post-use polymers were disposed of as solid waste. The local government may charge the dealer or pyrolysis facility a registration fee commensurate with and no greater than the cost incurred by the local government in operating its registration program. Registration program costs are limited to those costs associated with the activities described in this paragraph. Any reporting or registration process established by a local government with regard to recovered materials or post-use polymers is governed by this section and department rules adopted pursuant thereto.
(c) A local government may establish a process in which the local government may temporarily or permanently revoke the authority of a recovered materials dealer to do business within the local government if the local government finds the recovered materials dealer, after reasonable notice of the charges and an opportunity to be heard by an impartial party, has consistently and repeatedly violated state or local laws, ordinances, rules, and regulations.
(d) In addition to any other authority provided by law, a local government is hereby expressly authorized to prohibit a person or entity not certified under this section from doing business within the jurisdiction of the local government; to enter into a nonexclusive franchise or to otherwise provide for the collection, transportation, and processing of recovered materials at commercial establishments, provided that a local government may not require a certified recovered materials dealer to enter into such franchise agreement in order to enter into a contract with any commercial establishment located within the local government’s jurisdiction to purchase, collect, transport, process, or receive source-separated recovered materials; and to enter into an exclusive franchise or to otherwise provide for the exclusive collection, transportation, and processing of recovered materials at single-family or multifamily residential properties.
(e) Nothing in this section shall prohibit a local government from enacting ordinances designed to protect the public’s general health, safety, and welfare.
(f) As used in this section:

1. “Commercial establishment” means a property or properties zoned or used for commercial or industrial uses, or used by an entity exempt from taxation under s. 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, and excludes property or properties zoned or used for single-family residential or multifamily residential uses.
2. “Local government” means a county or municipality.
3. “Certified recovered materials dealer” means a dealer certified under this section.
(3) A recovered materials dealer or an association whose members include recovered materials dealers may initiate an action for injunctive relief or damages for alleged violations of this section. The court may award to the prevailing party or parties reasonable attorney fees and costs.
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