David Hoggard on Cone Mills/ITG Methane Gas Deal; December 6, 2004, with some Triad Watch from 2011

David Hoggard; "I meant to comment yesterday on the latest example of how some members of the Greensboro City Council are in the dark about actions by the City Manager’s office. The N&R’s article yesterday about how the City has agreed to give Cone Mills free methane gas that bubbles up and is captured at the White Street landfill was news to not only me… but also to several members of the Council. Matt Williams reported…
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‘When asked about the arrangement, some council members said they were not aware that Cone wasn’t going to pay for the new landfill gas…. “I’ll be honest. I didn’t pick up on that,” Council member Sandy Carmany. “I did not realize that it was being given away.” Council member Yvonne Johnson also said she thought the city was going to charge Cone for the gas. Council member Robbie Perkins said he supports the plan, saying it helps both the city and a local business.”
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The article suggests our City Council has been placed on a ‘need to know’ basis by Assistant Manager Mitch Johnson and others. Councilwoman Gatton was completely up to speed and “said the deal was a good way to support a struggling local company without spending tax money.” according to the article… and I agree… but that’s not the point."

Back in March, I obtained the Sutton Kennerly report outlining the structural deficiencies at War Memorial Stadium. Come to find out, that June, 2003 report - which said that WMS is crumbling and was unsafe - was not only kept from the public, it was also apparently withheld from most members of the Council for reasons that are unclear.

If the City Manager’s office is giving away free gas to Cone Mills and deep-sixing scathing structural reports without telling all of our City Council about it, what else is out there?

Every other request for economic incentives to industry comes before the Council for a full public airing – or at least I thought they did. In my view. the deal for free gas for Cone Mills would have been a slam dunk if the matter had seen the light of day. The arrangement exhibits creativity and a true benefit to a long-cherished Greensboro industry without saddling the taxpayers with excessive Dell-like ransom. Hell, I’m surprised some member of Council didn’t make the issue a personal and very public cause because, on its face, the Cone-for-gas deal exhibits good government.

So why all of the secrecy? Is there something else going on? If there is… experience shows us it is possible that the City Manager’s office isn’t going to let the entire City Council in on it."

David Hoggard
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Who is going to get the White Street Landfill's methane in the new contracts? Wednesday, May 11, 2011
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http://www.textileworld.com/Articles/2013/July/Cone_Denim_Adds_Selvage_Denim_Capacity.html

http://www.just-style.com/news/cone-denim-expands-selvage-denim-capacity_id118526.aspx

International Textile Group has received $1 million worth of methane for free every year since 2007, said Dale Wyrick, Greensboro's field operations manager.

"If they had to pay the money for the methane gas, we run a significant risk and most likely a permanent risk of losing these jobs," said Greensboro Councilman Zack Matheny.

Matheny said the city needs to focus on the other half of the methane gas that is currently being burned off.

"What council and the city needs to figure out is how maybe we can become profitable off of that gas," Matheny said.
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If Greensboro gives away $1,785,000 worth of gas to not lose 150 relatively low paying jobs, and the city chose to leverage gas money into small business new hiring instead, could Greensboro create by far more higher paying jobs instead of hopefully “retaining” 150 for $11,900 per job per year ($1,785,000 / 150) for the same amount of money?
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John Hammer November 21, 2012; "The decision to switch from an RFP in February to an RFQ was based in part on input from the Waste Management and Recycling Task Force, a citizens' committee charged with exploring the methane issue along with garbage disposal and recycling.

In its final report to the council on Nov. 7, the task force said that because there are multiple options for capturing and using the methane and the city lacks experience with the issue, a coherent RFP would be difficult to write.

The task force's council liaison, Councilmember Nancy Vaughan, whose husband state Sen. Don Vaughan represents ITG and has represented it in its contract negotiations for the gas worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, said she liked the fact that an RFQ would bring experts with experience in multiple alternatives to the table, since the city doesn't have methane experts.

However, she said, she had forgotten that the council voted for an RFP in February.

Vaughan also said that there were some unique circumstances at the landfill that the city needed input on. For one thing the methane is running out, since the methane is produced from decomposing garbage and White Street has been closed to garbage since 2006.

Vaughan said there are questions about what would be needed to collect the methane, which she said degrades in quality as the supply runs out. That fact also gave her a sense of urgency, and she said, "I'd like to see it happen a little quicker, since the methane is finite."

Vaughan said the recycling and waste disposal contracts had taken attention away from methane this year. "Staff was busy working the hauling contract and the recycling contract, and then this thing was kind of a third leg," she said."
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Council could be required by ordinance to seek the best possible price for the methane, and citizens could petition for such an ordinance. The city charter allows such a measure to go to referendum if a sufficient number of residents sign the petition and the council then chooses not to enact it.

Lex Alexander; As for giving public property to a corporation, it’s an express violation of the N.C. Constitution, but the state Supreme Court ruled in 1996 in Maready v. City of Winston-Salem that it’s legal if the intent is to benefit the public economically and the benefit to the private interest is only “incidental.” Which is crap in real life but law in the rarified air of economic incentives.
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John Hammer, July 18, 2012; The city also found out from the Waste Management and Recycling Task Force that the White Street Landfill was the largest landfill in North Carolina that did not have a program to sell its methane. The White Street Landfill generates about $2 million worth of methane a year, about 40 percent of that is given to the International Textile Group that runs the old Cone Mills White Oak plant, and the rest is burned. One of the subcommittees of the task force looked at several options to use the methane, but so far the city has done nothing to move forward on selling or using the $2 million worth of methane that is being produced. The City Council might as well build a big bonfire and burn two million dollar bills in Phill G. McDonald Plaza every year and at least they could roast marshmallows. Money is supposed to be tight, but the city is giving away and burning $2 million worth of gas a year.
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"Landfill of the future: Turning trash into treasure"

City of Greensboro looks to use landfill methane; January 16, 2013