BFI Waste Systems of North America, Inc. v. Broward County

209 F.R.D. 509, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19388, 2002 WL 31112202
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. Florida
DecidedSeptember 24, 2002
DocketNo. 01-6655-CIV
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 209 F.R.D. 509 (BFI Waste Systems of North America, Inc. v. Broward County) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
BFI Waste Systems of North America, Inc. v. Broward County, 209 F.R.D. 509, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19388, 2002 WL 31112202 (S.D. Fla. 2002).

Opinion

ORDER

GONZALEZ, District Judge.

THIS MATTER has come before the Court on Defendant Broward County’s Motion to Dismiss (DE # 8) pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)7 and 19. The Defendant, Broward County (the “County”), claims that the Plaintiff, BFI Waste Systems of North America, Inc. (“BFI”), has failed to join persons needed for a just adjudication of this action. The matter has been fully briefed by able counsel and is ripe for disposition. For the reasons stated herein, the County’s Motion to Dismiss will be DENIED.

I. BACKGROUND1

This case shares a common factual background with another case recently adjudicated by this Court and reported as, Coastal Carting Ltd., Inc. v. Broward County, Florida, 75 F.Supp.2d 1350 (S.D.Fla.l999). For the sake of clarity, the Court will recount the relevant parts of that common factual background along with the facts that directly gave rise to the instant ease.

The relationships between and among the various agreements, ordinances, parties, and persons absent from this case, raised by the County’s Motion to Dismiss, are complex. But, because the precise nature of these relationships is an essential element of the foundation upon which the Court’s Order is based, the Court will attempt to elucidate them as succinctly as practicable.

With its landfills burgeoning in the late 1980s, the County, like many political subdivisions in states nationwide at that time, took steps to address the problems associated with the disposal of solid waste. The County, along with twenty-three (23) of the County’s incorporated municipalities (the “Cities”), entered into “An Interlocal Agreement with Broward, County for Solid Waste Disposal” (the “Interlocal Agreement”). See Compl. 119 and Compl. Ex. A. (a copy of the Inter-local Agreement).

The Interlocal Agreement, and the ordinances adopted, respectively, by the individual Cities and the County pursuant thereto, collectively established the Broward Solid Waste Disposal District (the “District”). See Interlocal Agreement H 5.1; Coastal Carting, 75 F.Supp.2d at 1352. The District was therefore comprised of twenty-four (24) separate entities: the twenty-three (23) incorporated municipalities — i.e., the Cities; and the twenty-fourth entity, which was the County itself.2 See Coastal Carting, 75 F.Supp.2d at 1352. Importantly for addressing the merits of the County’s Motion to Dismiss, the County assumed its various obligations under the Interlocal Agreement in two distinct capacities: (1) the County assumed some of its obligations as the representative of the unincorporated areas of the County, and (2) the County assumed other obligations as the County itself, that is, the political subdivision in which the Cities are situated. See Interlocal Agreement H 1.5 (“the COUNTY is entering this Agreement both representing unincorporated County, a waste generation area with solid waste requiring disposal, and COUNTY, as the party assuming the obligation under this Agreement for the disposal of solid waste for the [Cities] as well as for the unincorporated County”).

The contractual rights and obligations created in the Interlocal Agreement are manifold. The Cities and the County agreed that [511]*511the County, either by itself or by engaging independent contractors, would construct and maintain a “resource recovery system,” which would include two new solid waste disposal facilities. See Interlocal Agreement 11111.3, 1.4, and 2.17. The County financed the construction of these state-of-the-art disposal facilities by issuing bonds. See Compl. 116. The Cities and the County also agreed that the Cities and the County, acting as representative of the unincorporated areas, would adopt “flow control ordinances” directing that solid waste generated in their respective geographic areas be delivered to the designated facilities of the resource recovery system. See Interlocal Agreement 113.2.3

To ensure that the County would be able to meet its financial obligations associated with the bond issuance, as well as its other obligations under the Interlocal Agreement, the Cities and the County — again, acting as representative of the unincorporated areas— also agreed, inter alia, that they would include in any contracts between them and solid waste haulers a provision requiring all solid waste hauled under such contracts to be delivered to designated disposal facilities within the resource recovery system. See Interlocal Agreement 113.3. To avoid ambiguity regarding whom such hauling contract provisions were intended to benefit, the In-terlocal Agreement provides that “[t]he COUNTY will be a third party beneficiary” of such provisions. See Interlocal Agreement 113.3. In essence, therefore, the County itself is intended to be the “third party beneficiary” of the contracts it signs, as the representative of the unincorporated areas, with solid waste haulers.

The import of all of this is made clearer by Articles 5, 6 and 7 of the Interlocal Agreement, which relate, respectively, to the following: the creation of the Resource Recovery Board (the “RRB”); the setting and charging of “tipping fees”4 and service charges; and the collection of tipping fees. See Interlocal Agreement Art. 5, 6 and 7. The RRB is the governing body and representative of the District — which, again, is comprised of the Cities and the County, and was established by the Interlocal Agreement and ratifying ordinances adopted by the Cities and the County. See Interlocal Agreement Y1Í 2.16, 5.1. The RRB is a nine-member body comprised of persons appointed by the County Board of Commissioners, the Cities, and the President of the Broward County League of Cities. See Interlocal Agreement 115.2. The RRB is charged with, among other things, creating a “Plan of Operations,” which is the corpus of rules and regulations under which the resource recovery system will be administered. See Interlocal Agreement 11112.14, 4.7 and 5.1.

■The RRB, as the governing body of the District, adopts and revises the tipping fees that solid waste haulers are charged for delivering solid waste to the disposal facilities of the resource recovery system. See Inter-local Agreement H 6.1. While the RRB sets the amount of tipping fees haulers are to be charged, under the Interlocal Agreement it is the County, as the County itself, that bills haulers and collects the tipping fees. See Interlocal Agreement 117.1. The Interlocal Agreement further provides that the Cities and the County, as representative of the unincorporated areas, will include in any contracts with haulers provisions requiring the haulers to pay tipping fees to the County, and that “the COUNTY shall be a third party beneficiary of such provision.” See Interlocal Agreement K 7.5. Once again, the County itself is the “third party beneficiary” of contracts the County, acting as representative of the unincorporated areas, enters into with haulers.

[512]*512The express purpose of the Interlocal Agreement can be summed up as follows.

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Bluebook (online)
209 F.R.D. 509, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 19388, 2002 WL 31112202, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bfi-waste-systems-of-north-america-inc-v-broward-county-flsd-2002.