SOUTHERN WASTE SYS. v. THE CITY OF CORAL SPRINGS

• Decision Date: 22 January 2010
• Docket Number: Case No. 06-61448-CIV.
• Citation: 687 F. Supp.2d 1342
• Parties: SOUTHERN WASTE SYSTEMS, LLC, a Florida limited liability company; and Sun Recycling, LLC, a Florida limited liability company, Plaintiffs, v. THE CITY OF CORAL SPRINGS, FLORIDA, a Florida Municipal Corporation; Waste Management, Inc. of Florida, a Florida Corporation, and the Broward Solid Waste Disposal District, a Florida Dependent Special District, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Florida

687 F.Supp.2d 1342

SOUTHERN WASTE SYSTEMS, LLC, a Florida limited liability company; and Sun Recycling, LLC, a Florida limited liability company, Plaintiffs, v. THE CITY OF CORAL SPRINGS, FLORIDA, a Florida Municipal Corporation; Waste Management, Inc. of Florida, a Florida Corporation, and the Broward Solid Waste Disposal District, a Florida Dependent Special District, Defendants.

Case No. 06-61448-CIV.

United States District Court, S.D. Florida.

January 22, 2010.

Michael Virgil Elsberry, Terry C. Young, Wayne Andrew Sorrell, II, Terry C. Young, Lowndes Drosdick Doster Kantor & Reed, Orlando, FL, Stuart Z. Grossman, Grossman Roth PA, Coral Gables, FL, Guy Millard Burns, Johnson Pope Bokor Ruppel & Burns, Tampa, FL, for Plaintiffs.

Kerry Lee Ezrol, Goren Cherof Doody & Ezrol P.A., Katherine Howland Miller, Brian Kenneth Hole, Erika R. Royal, Holland & Knight, Ari Jonathan Glazer, Moskowitz Mandell Salim & Simowitz, Fort Lauderdale, FL, for Defendants.

ORDER GRANTING SUMMARY JUDGMENT FOR DEFENDANTS (OTHER THAN ON CORAL SPRINGS COUNTERCLAIM); ADMINISTRATIVELY CLOSING THE CASE PENDING APPEAL

ELAN S. GOLD, District Judge.

I. INTRODUCTION

This matter is before the Court on the following motions: (1) Motion for Summary Judgment by Defendant City of Coral Springs, Florida ("Coral Springs") DE 275; (2) Motion for Summary Judgment by Defendant Waste Management of Florida, Inc. ("Waste Management") DE 281; (3) Motion for Summary Judgment by the Broward Solid Waste Disposal District ("District") DE 288; (4) Motion for Partial Summary Judgment by Plaintiffs Southern Waste Systems, LLC ("Southern Waste") and Sun Recycling, LLC's ("Sun") DE 292¹; (5) Coral Springs' Motion To Strike or Exclude Addendum to Expert Report of Mark P. Berkman DE 235;² (6) Waste Management's Motion to Strike Plaintiffs' Statement of Material Facts DE 337; and (7) Waste Management's Motions to Strike Affidavit of Charles Lomangino and Anthony Lomangino DE 338 and 339.³ I held oral argument on these motions on Friday, January 15, 2010.⁴

II. SUMMARY OF THE PLEADINGS

The Plaintiffs have filed a three-count Third Amended Complaint ("Third Amended Complaint") DE 160 seeking damages, declaratory and injunctive relief against Waste Management, the City of Coral Springs and the District. In Count I, Plaintiffs allege that the Defendants have violated 42 U.S.C. § 1983 by violating the Plaintiffs' rights to engage in interstate commerce under the Dormant Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, U.S. Art. I, § 8, cl. 3 (the "Dormant Commerce Clause"). In Count II, the Plaintiffs allege that Defendants have violated Plaintiffs' rights to engage in foreign commerce under the Dormant Commerce Clause.⁵ In Count III, Plaintiffs seek a declaratory judgment as to "those operations that Southern Waste and Sun may carry on within Broward County." (Third Am. Compl. ¶ 53).

Prior to the filing of the Third Amended Complaint, I had granted the Defendants' motion to dismiss Count III of the Second Amended Complaint. DE 121. That Count was pled as an alternative declaratory judgment claim to the effect that the "materials" the Plaintiffs handle are not governed by Chapter 403, Florida Statutes. Although I did not address Count III with prejudice, it was not further amended in the Third Amended Complaint.

The Defendants have filed answers and numerous affirmative defenses to the Third Amended Complaint. DE 206, 207, 210. Coral Springs also has filed a counterclaim DE 73. Specifically, the City seeks damages for tortuous interference against Southern Waste, an accounting and injunctive relief. Counter-Defendant Southern Waste has filed an answer to the counterclaim DE 78. Because the counterclaim turns on the validity of the Franchise Agreement and City Ordinance under the Dormant Commerce Clause, I conclude, pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 54(b), that the resolution of the counterclaim should await a final determination of the Dormant Commerce Clause issue in the event of any appeal. Because there is no just reason for any delay of the final resolution of the Dormant Commerce Clause issue on appeal, and because I conclude there are material facts in dispute as to liability and damages on the counterclaim,⁶ I shall direct entry of a final judgment on Defendants' motions for summary judgment, but not on the City's counterclaim which I shall stay pending the results of any appeal to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. I also shall direct entry of a final judgment on the dismissal of Count III of the Second Amended Complaint.

III. FACTUAL BACKGROUND AND SUMMARY JUDGMENT STANDARD

The parties have filed a voluminous record purporting to comply with Local Rule requirements on summary judgment and by submitting supporting affidavits and a multitude of depositions and the like DE 277-280, 282, 284-286, 290-291, 294, 305, 306, 309-312, 314, 316-318, 323, 335-336, 343, 348, 350, 358-359. Because it would not be helpful to the resolution of this cause, and because it would unduly lengthen this Order without any meaningful benefit, I decline to set forth a detailed factual recitation which discusses every fact presented, particularly where many of those facts are not material. Instead, I set forth below material facts which I conclude are not in dispute as supported by the record (with all inferences in favor of the non-moving party), and which are relevant to determine the specific issues raised by the respective parties' summary judgment motions. I do so based on my own review of this voluminous factual record, including the pleadings, the discovery and disclosure materials on file, and the affidavits.

My review has been made more difficult because the Plaintiffs have not complied with Southern District of Florida Local Rule 7.5(B) by providing a single concise statement of material facts as to which they contend that there exists a genuine issue to be tried. They have provided three Statements of Facts. In addition, Plaintiffs have provided an "Issue Statement" which they have mislabeled as containing facts without proper citations to the record. Notwithstanding, I decline to grant Waste Management's motion to strike DE 337.

I have applied the traditional standard for review under Fed.R.Civ.P. 56 and Eleventh Circuit case law to the undisputed material facts as determined below. This standard has been well-summarized in the parties' briefs. See DE 276 p. 3-4; DE 281, pp. 5-6; DE 292, p. 4-5. Accordingly, I incorporate the standard by reference here.⁷

IV. Summary of the Court's Ruling on Summary Judgment

I conclude the Defendants are entitled to summary judgment as a matter of law, and that the Plaintiffs' motion for partial summary judgment should be denied. The crux of this case is that Southern Waste wants the right to compete with Waste Management, the exclusive franchise holder for the collection of commercial waste and debris ("C & D") in the City of Coral Springs. It then wants to haul the collected commercial waste to its sister company, Sun, which has in-District waste processing and recycling facilities in Broward County.⁸ By doing so, Southern Waste and Sun thereby seek to increase their market share for commercial C & D collection and processing.⁹

In effect, the Plaintiffs want this Court, by judicial edict, to make Coral Springs an "open city," like Hollywood, Fort Lauderdale and Oakland Park (members of the District) for purposes of commercial solid waste collection.¹⁰ The only restriction Plaintiffs can identify as it pertains to their business in Coral Springs is the City's refusal to allow Southern Waste to place collection containers at commercial C & D sites. This is strictly an issue associated with the exclusive Franchise Agreement between Coral Springs and Waste Management. While the Plaintiffs' primary aim is to invalidate the exclusive Franchise Agreement, and the companion city ordinance, they have attempted, in their Third Amended Complaint, to blur their constitutional claims by referencing so-called "flow control" regulations put in place by the District. The Plaintiffs then call the District's regulations, the City Ordinance and the Franchise Agreement "the Regime" without meaningfully distinguishing among the components of "the Regime." The Plaintiffs use this tactical approach to avoid clear Eleventh Circuit case law to which Southern Waste was a party.

At the same time, Plaintiffs are not against exclusive franchises within Broward cities. They are apparently happy with them when they are able to win them, as Southern Waste has done in Oakland Park within the District. In those instances, it has hardly confessed such arrangements constitute violations of the commerce clause. At no time during the pendency of this litigation has it withdrawn from exclusivity arrangements in Oakland Park.¹¹ But neither Southern Waste nor Sun had competed for the exclusive franchise in Coral Springs. They are unhappy that Waste Management did, and that it enjoys the benefits of the exclusive franchise to the Plaintiffs' financial detriment through the remaining term of the Franchise Agreement.

Essentially, all three counts of the Third Amended Complaint return to the basic issue of Waste Management's sole right to collect commercial construction and demolition debris as part of its Franchise Agreement with Coral Springs. All of the evidence on summary judgment demonstrates that Plaintiffs' only real complaint is that Southern Waste is prevented by City Ordinance § 8-3 and the Franchise Agreement from collecting construction and demolition debris at commercial sites within the city.

While the Plaintiffs implicate the District in the Third Amended Complaint, nothing from the District prevents Southern Waste from collecting C & D in Coral Springs. Instead, C & D collected in the District may be transported by haulers to Sun's facilities without any interference from the District under any of its plans of operation or interlocal compacts.¹²...