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Peeking through cracks in the fence, pressing one’s ear to the wall, one can deduce what’s going on in the lawsuit between Rainbow Disposal and Huntington Beach’s Ocean View School District DESPITE the confidentiality of the negotiations – given the simple fact that a settlement has still not been reached, and the matter is on its way to a jury trial later this year (where Rainbow will surely faceplant.)
There is a distance between the “stipulated agreement” that was FORCED on Rainbow by the South Coast Air Quality Management District last year, and what the school district and neighborhood have been rightfully seeking since 2013 – and that distance entails several million dollars, which, if saved, can be pocketed by Rainbow principals. We’ll get to that in a bit.
Here is what the OVSD has been asking for in their lawsuit that goes BEYOND the stipulated agreement, all of which is quite reasonable and necessary for the students’ and neighbors’ health:
- OVSD wants 100% enclosure of the facility. (The stipulated agreement doesn’t require that.)
- Only 5% of the structure should consist of doors that can open.
- The doors should be AUTOMATIC, not “pneumatic” or human-controlled, so that they are not left open now and then accidentally while toxic concrete dust goes floating into the breeze.
- There must be “negative air pressure” on the doors so that when they’re opened (for trucks etc.) the air containing possible hazardous particles gets SUCKED BACK IN.
- The air handling must include both state-of-the-art VENTILATION and FILTRATION.
- Everything must be enclosed, including “inert materials” that Rainbow currently keeps outside, such as dirt, mulch, asphalt, gravel, and the dread crushed concrete.
- OVSD wants Rainbow to pay for the air conditioning at Oak View School which has been ruined by decades of seagull infestation many times worse than any other school in this beach town (most of which are much closer to the beach.)
- And finally, OVSD wants Rainbow to provide an “NPR” room, or enclosed lunch area, for the school – for decades now whenever the stench is unbearable the students have been forced to eat in the hallways.
These are all the demands of OVSD which go beyond the SCAQMD stipulated agreement, and since we know that there has been NO SETTLEMENT after two and a half years, we can only conclude that Rainbow is balking at some or all of these demands. And why would that be?
Jeff Snow, Rainbow’s senior municipal service manager, now named “Businessman of the Year” by the kleptocratic HB Chamber of Commerce.
Obviously, addressing those demands will cost money, and it’s normal for a corporation to want to spend as little as possible – reprehensible but understandable to resist spending more than necessary even for the benefit of the community’s health.
BUT, as the “Garbaginati” reminded us the other day, during the process of selling itself off to Republic Services, Rainbow was forced to put aside $16.8 million into an escrow account to cover any cleanup costs they had incurred. So, it’s not like they don’t have the money sitting around specifically for this purpose.
Well, as it turns out, whatever part of that escrow account is NOT spent on cleanup can be split and pocketed by the old, employee owners of Rainbow – your Susan Gordons, your Jerry Moffatts, your Jeff Snows. A nearly irresistible motivation for doing it all on the cheap, wouldn’t you say?
And sure enough, the amount Rainbow promises to spend on remediation has gotten smaller and smaller over the years since 2009 – starting at $20 million and now ending at $10 million after they got their mild orders from SCAQMD. How unlikely is it that the real reason Rainbow is refusing to settle with OVSD is the $6.8 million difference between what they are required to do now and what they really SHOULD do?
$6.8 million, to split up and enjoy. It’s going to take a jury trial to PRY doing the right thing out of these covetous weasels.
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Meanwhile to all appearances Rainbow brass have been hunkered down unhealthily in their war room like a gaggle of paranoid Nixons. Garbaginati told the story of the company’s stormy relationship with their rival trash haulers CC&R, and how the latter keeps winning huge settlements against them for their crooked business practices.
Apparently it’s now an article of faith within Rainbow’s boardroom that there MUST be a connection between their two persecutors – their mean rivals who keep suing them successfully for their cheating, and the school district and neighborhood who, inexplicably after decades of passivity, are now fighting them bare-knuckles for their health and dignity.
We can be sure of this because Rainbow’s deranged propagandist Chris Epting has been hinting at this connection with no proof, for at least a year. Forever promising some sort of bombshell exposé, poor mad Chris has been sent by those he admires, to find the Holy Grail of some sort of proof of collusion, but finds himself unable to do anything but shout words like “corrupt” over and over.
Half of Huntington Beach wonders what Chris is getting from Rainbow to keep up this wacky crusade hour after hour, day after day. Knowing him as I do, I doubt he’s getting paid by anything but the chance to feel important, and an opportunity to lash out endlessly at a public servant who had the gall to snub him – OVSD’s feisty president Gina Clayton-Tarvin.
On the other hand, how symbiotic is the relationship between this unbalanced columnist and this irresponsible company, when they actually use his online ravings as EVIDENCE in their filings? LOLOL… Click for larger image, and see the “exhibit” stamp on this printout from Chris’ blog… ROTFLMAO
Wait a second, if Chris Epting is only getting paid in “attaboys” and the false promise of getting revenge on a smart woman that apparently “dared to cross him”, he’s dumber than I thought. Mind blown.
Well, that’s just what I think, but I may be naive and over-charitable.
This information is so important.
Republic Services, Inc. says:
“In October 2014, we acquired all of the shares of Rainbow Disposal Co., Inc. (Rainbow) for $112.0 million cash, of which $16.8 million of the funds were placed into an escrow account pursuant to a holdback arrangement and classified as restricted cash. We also assumed a capital lease agreement with a fair value of $25.2 million for operational facilities in Southern California, and entered into agreements not to compete, along with other restrictive covenants, with key executives. We allocated $53.5 million of the purchase price to property and equipment and $34.8 million to intangible assets. We also assumed $18.9 million of liabilities. Approximately $66 million of the remaining purchase price was allocated to goodwill and represents the future economic benefits expected to arise from other assets acquired that could not be individually identified and separately recognized. Rainbow’s operations in Southern California include hauling routes, a recycling facility, a transfer station, a compressed natural gas (CNG) refueling station, and a CNG-powered vehicle fleet. The acquisition is not material to the Company’s results of operations.”
http://services.corporate-ir.net/SEC/Document.Service?id=P3VybD1hSFIwY0RvdkwyRndhUzUwWlc1cmQybDZZWEprTG1OdmJTOWtiM2R1Ykc5aFpDNXdhSEEvWVdOMGFXOXVQVkpVUmlacGNHRm5aVDB4TURjek5ETXdPU1p6ZFdKemFXUTlOVGM9JnR5cGU9MyZmbj1SZXB1YmxpY1NlcnZpY2VzSW5jLnJ0Zg==
*Sticky wickets aside…..WHOA…..very clever these Yankees!
Maybe we really do need to go back to Harvard Business School or University of Pennsylvania – Wharton School of Business – like Trump eh? Beats the hell out of straight forward Mergers and Acquisitions…..huh? How many lawyers did they use to put this deal together?
Vern you wrote a lazy man’s story you can’t fix that! You didn’t take the time to look at the other side disappointing. Rainbow was there years before the school district built the school why?
Stan, it’s not your company any more. I’m sure you would enclose properly if it was.
And I’ve written elsewhere about how both the transfer station and the school grew over the decades until they were nearly touching each other, due to bad decisions on all sides. That’s not the topic any more.
“Rainbow was there years before the school district built the school”
And?
Well, Stan, perhaps your memory is failing, but I looked into it, refreshed my own memory … and the school has been there since 1967; the area wasn’t permitted to be a dump until 14 years later in 1981. I can upload the documents if I must…
Give my best to the wife, keep up the good work on the Fair Board, and don’t take this so personal.
Vern my memory is fine your snarky remark was not necessary Rainbow facility was built approximately 1956 ….11 years before the district decided to build the school next to an industrial area they have no other schools with zoning like that next to a school in Huntington Beach my point was why knowing what existed next to them did they build a school there.
. . . and?
Yawn…. the “Rainbow facility” was not a dump yet, was not one until 1981. The school grew, Rainbow grew, you guys got permission to make it a dump in 1981, and I’ve seen where you personally promised that the “waste wouldn’t stink,” there wouldn’t be “odiferous materials.” Don’t make me upload documents here, I’m trying to work on other things.
Nobody’s blaming the whole situation on you, or anyone else. We are where we are. Why do you feel like you have to be Rainbow’s spokesman now?
Vern let me correct you it’s never been a dumb it’s a transfer station I don’t have to look for for documents to see that you don’t even call by the correct name
And how is it not a dump? Garbage is DUMPED there. Just cuz there’s another more pleasant sounding name doesn’t mean it’s not a dump.
A dump is known these days as a landfill.
No I want you to be really actually it’s a transfer station…trucks come in and transfer waste into larger trucks they then take it to the dump or landfillwhere it is permanently buried l would hope your above the snarky in accurate terms
. . . AND?
Hey Stanley, look over here!
Well I can’t argue with the experts!
Stan, why do you care – didn’t you sell the joint? As Steve Miller said- “Take The Money And Run” my man, it’s way easier that way. Plus, there is this nutjob named Chris Epting who has been running around disqualifying people who he deems don’t have a stake in this mess (get it? get it?).
My crime is that I am living in Nashville right now, despite owning property less than a mile away from your old dump and less than a mile away from the Wintersberg channel that carries the pollutants from your old dump to the Ocean. So if a property owner “in absentia” is deemed irrelevant I think you might be in big trouble if Epting sniffs you out.
Just watching out for you my man. BTW say hello to nephew Daniel.
Vern I thought you held yourself to a higher Shelf the word in the flyer says public dumping it doesn’t call it a dump. I think we’ve said enough
Hmmm… I must need better glasses. Have a good day sir.
Right…the website doesn’t call the Public Dump a dump. It calls it a…wait, wha….nevermind.
The puzzle of why old owner Stan Tkaczyk is all worked up has been solved – Stan has been named on one of the lawsuits, out of necessity, because he still owns some of the “ground” that the dump sits on.
Sorry about that Stan, but you do realize this is just pro forma and you’re not going to be held personally liable for anything, don’t you?