SPSA's chief financial officer announces his resignation

SPSA does reimburse the Beach for the cost of operation of the V.B. Landfill, which includes equipment cost and labor costs. SPSA disposes of ash and residue at the site, and while in some years, SPSA has used the landfill in Suffolk, the Beach and SPSA signed the Ash and Residue contract that stipulates the agreement between the parties. This agreement also allows the Beach to dispose of municipal waste up to set percentage (5%) at no cost and to allow others to dispose of waste there, but agrees to charge the same fee as SPSA charges per ton. In simple, short, and concise language, the City has an agreement with SPSA, signed at the same time that the Use and Support Agreement was signed which governs the use of the Landfill by SPSA. Those who now criticize this agreement signed in August of 1984 just want out of their agreements.

Can you explain to me what SPSA pays for at the Va Beach landfill? Does SPSA pay for the purchase of the heavy equipment (compactors, dozers etc)? Does SPSA pay for any of the salaries directly or indirectly? Does anyone have an estimated figure on how much SPSA pays yearly (plus debt intrest)towards the operation of the VA Beach landfill that SPSA does not use? This is not meant as a dig. I truely have only heard rumors about this and do not know whats true and what is embelished. No sarcasm directed.. Please don't respond with sarcasm (emily).

Well, of course Emily, the simple explanation is that you are once again poorly informed. When the Beach considered the implementation of an expanded recycling program, it went to SPSA and requested that SPSA adopt the collection of recycling material in automated fashion with the 90 gallon bins. SPSA declined, but posed no objection to the city's expanded program which replaced the SPSA program of using the small containers that had to be hand sorted. SPSA provides this service on a cost basis, so there was no financial detriment to SPSA at all. The City Council in Chesapeake has been led down the path of pursuit of SPSA's demise, apparantly with a zealot's pursuit of transferring its fiscal obligations with no regard to the contract Chesapeake signed. Truth and justice have been the first victims of this pursuit, the loss of 450 jobs and the loss of each city's coveted credit rating will be next. Way to go, Chesapeake.

If Virginia beach honored all it's contracts, how do you explain violating the contract with the recycling move?

You see Reid, Emily is the spokesperson for the City of Chesapeake which has opened a full scale assault on the agreements signed when SPSA was created. Point is, they sued and lost, so now the battle has shifted to the legislature and to create internal divisions in the organization so it will fail. Their desired result is that the taxpayers of Virginia Beach bail them out of the deal they made 25 years ago but which they do not wish to honor today. So Reid, you and the members of the VBTA can hoist Pat Murphy up as your hero and follow him to the promised land, which in the end will result in the Beach, having followed the agreements in scrupulous fashion, will get forced to pay off obligations that belong to Chesapeake. Nice job Reid; you've given Emily all the help you can. Get ready to pay the price.

No surprise here...it's Virginia Beach. Virginia Beach violated the SPSA contract when they started their own recycling program. They even extract host money from SPSA for a closed landfill. They bullied the SPSA board for years. For years VB voted to increase SPSA's debt knowing they didn't pay any of it. Now they refuse to be a part of the debt solution.
Last July the paper had an article about VB's moves to reopen Mt. Trashmore 2. They have to be planning to walk away from SPSA and leave 7 other cities holding the debt bag.
If this ends up in the courts, VB will be forced to pay it's share of the debt. Right now, they're trying everything they can to make the 7 other cities pay. My council people don't want this kind of forced taxation on their residents any more. Why should our homeowners be saddled with higher trash bills to help VB, the largest, richest city in Virginia?

Reid, you are a real hoot. This is about disposal of regional solid waste, and there is no agenda to take over the region by regionalists. It is simply a collective effort to do more cheaply what each member could have done individually at much greater expense. And frankly, if that were the sole measure, SPSA actually does that quite well. It is ironic that the ReEnergy proposal recognizes that by a willingness to buy exactly the same assets, but requires that the cities sign new, twenty year contracts. Well, we could do exactly that now, and the issue of high tip fees would disappear. But the problem is that the existing agreements expire in 2018, so SPSA can only finance over a few short years, and that makes debt service quite high, hence high tip fees. You of course blame all of this on regionalism, while in fact it is simply some cities want to shift their obligations to others.

Mike, if SPSA did not have the ability to pay back the hundreds of millions that it borrowed, why did they borrow the money in the first place? Secondly, clearly the "game" was to "buy" political support for the "benefit" of the "regional agenda" by agreeing to give cities such as Virginia beach a "good deal" on their tipping fees so that the "regionalists" could "buy" political influence for the support of the General Assembly's creation of SPSA and to advance the unaccountable REGIONAL GOVERNANCE model - in effect usurping to power of VOTERS to have control over those that control our waste management. SPSA advocates KNEW the "deals" they were making could not be sustained - but they made them anyway and now they try to blame others for wanting SPSA to honor the deals SPSA's BOD made! Mike sounds like those people that signed mortgages they can't afford and want to blame the banks for lending them the money they agreed to pay back!

Look MPC, I make no apology for being the representative from Virginia Beach. That said, I acknowledge that renegotiation of the original agreements is necessary. In that renegotiation, member jurisdictions must deal realistically with their own natural advantages and disadvantages. The Beach has invested in the creation of a landfill that is permitted and operational and may be expanded. Chesapeake has not. In the renegotiation, this difference in situation is a necessary starting point for reaching an equitable agreement. To think that Virginia Beach and Suffolk are simply going to cede their advantage to the other members is neither fair nor equitable.

"I think the tip fee will be in the $250-$350 range but the good news is your fee will be 53 bucks!" Doesn't exactly sound like you recommending your city will need to renegotiate its fees to help out the other member communities. I also noted that when you speak about the positive things of SPSA you use "we", but when you speak of the negative it is "they". You do realize you are a SPSA board member and decisions made by the board reflect upon all members? When the state auditors and other commissions speak of the mismanagement by the SPSA board you share equally with the other board members in the blame. The report didn't say board member A did this and board member B did this, it cited the board for not guiding SPSA clearly. Wake up, Mike, you were just as much asleep at the switch as the other members. What will you tell the 400 SPSA employees that will be unemployed if the doors close because of the boards mismanagement. "Sorry, I voted against it" won't help them pay their mortgage and feed their families.

Ohio1935, it depends upon whether you are a residential or a residentaial or a commercial cusotmer, and also perhaps in what member city/county you reside. Assuming that SPSA defaults and the padlocks go on the disposal sites and the transfer stations, commercial haulers will have to make other arrangements for disposal. If Waste Management makes its landfill in Hampton available to other haulers, much of the commercial waste may go there. For residential users, the member jurisdictions must make alternate disposal plans. The Beach has a landfill, so Beach citizens will likely see little change. However, to my knowledge, the other cities/counties do not have permitted sanitary landfills and they must rely on the commercial sector for transfer and transportation to remote landfills or other disposal sites.

Well MPC, perhaps you missed the part where I said...."Therefore, I believe the members must agree to meet to discuss the renegotiation of conditions under which SPSA was chartered. I recommend that the report prepared for the CAOs by SCS for waste management post 2018 ought to be the outline for new arrangements now that will ensure all of the members have access to the municipal solid waste disposal assets in which we have invested millions of dollars."

What happens to my trash when I put it out in April and SPSA is out of buisness? Please give real answers and avoid the sarcasm.

do not listen to the recommendations made by the executives of SPSA. The BOD's are not SPSA employees they are appointed by the communities. If they took ownership for SPSA and voted for what is best for SPSA then this situation would never have happened. Mike Barret tries to defend his position but does not realize he is part of the problem. If you watch the 2/3/09 informal working session of the Va Beach city council available on the internet you can see he really doesn't get it either. He takes his marching orders from the Va Beach city council like the rest of the other board members do. If he was truly invested in the concept of SPSA he would recommend to his council that they should renegotiate their deal for the sake of regionalism. If you watch the working session you will see that Va Beach is trying to profit from the demise of SPSA. They talk about offering the other cities the opportunity to bring their trash to Mt Trashmore II. How nice, at what cost I bet it would be higher then what the cities are paying now.

Now when will the rest of the mis-management and blind-eyed BOD do the honorable thing and step down in disgrace as well?

Walt Hunter is an incredibly competent and effective finance director. His departure is just a further indication of the failure of the members to live up to their fiscal obligations. I believe SPSA will default in April, and unless the bondholders step in now and force the members to pay the required tip fee to fund operations and debt, the padlock will go on all the doors. Eventually, after much disruption, the assets will be sold, the bondholders will be paid off, and life will go back to normal. Walt did his best to ensure that members knew the consequences of their failure to act, but of course, continued denial of the fiscal consequences of not paying off debt eventually leaves you with no options. SPSA as an operating entity is out of options and will soon close unless the bondholders act. A situation that could have been prevented was not prevented because collective action was not possible.

How can all these people run this company in the ground and not be charged with a crime? NO ONE HAS BEEN CHARGED!!!! Why?

"Run away! Run away! We can't hide the truth any longer. We're busted!" The chickens have come home to roost and we all can clearly see the results of the failed experiment in unaccountable, all appointed REGIONAL GOVERNING and an attempt to hide public debt off the books of local governments and our General Assembly in Richmond.

Who would have thought they even had a chief financial officer? I thought it was a few guys with a TI30 that didn't know how to use it! Now we really have a face and a name for this failure.