Town of Glocester v. R. I. Solid Waste Management Corp.

• Decision Date: 03 August 1978
• Docket Number: No. 77-125-A,77-125-A
• Citation: 390 A.2d 348,120 R.I. 606
• Parties: , 12 ERC 1334 TOWN OF GLOCESTER v. R. I. SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT CORP. et al. ppeal.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

Page 348

390 A.2d 348

120 R.I. 606, 12 ERC 1334

TOWN OF GLOCESTER v. R. I. SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT CORP. et al.

No. 77-125-Appeal.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

Aug. 3, 1978.

[120 R.I. 609] George W. Shuster, Providence, for plaintiff.

Albert B. West, Providence, for R. I. Solid Waste Management Corp.

Leonard A. Kiernan, Jr., Providence, for William Davis d. b. a. Glocester-Smithfield Regional Landfill.

OPINION

JOSLIN, Justice.

This civil action for declaratory and injunctive relief was brought in the Superior Court by the town of Glocester (Glocester) and was submitted to a trial justice sitting without a jury on an agreed statement of facts. The defendants are the Rhode Island Solid Waste Management Corporation (the Corporation), a public instrumentality exercising public and essential governmental functions, William Davis d. b. a. Glocester-Smithfield Regional Landfill (Davis) and the Town of East Greenwich (East Greenwich). The real issue in the case is whether the Legislature in enacting P.L.1974, ch. 176, now G.L.1956 (1968 Reenactment) ch. 46.1 of title 23, the Rhode Island Solid Waste Management Corporation Act (the Waste Management Act) so preempted the regulation of solid waste collection and disposal as to render invalid and unenforceable in the circumstances here prevailing certain portions of Glocester's ordinances which antedate the enactment of the Waste Management Act and ban the importation of solid waste materials. The trial justice decided that question in favor of the defendants and Glocester appealed.

It appears from the facts stipulated that, in September 1974, Davis entered into a contract with Glocester for the disposal of Glocester's waste materials at a sanitary landfill which he owns and operates, and which is located partly in Glocester. There were then in effect several Glocester ordinances banning the dumping in that town of waste materials not gathered from local sources. Notwithstanding that prohibition, Davis contracted to receive waste materials from East Greenwich. At oral argument the parties stipulated that this contract had been approved by the Corporation.

At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial justice declared the anti-importation provisions, rather than the contract, invalid and unenforceable. His reasons were that those provisions (1) directly conflicted with the state legislation in the field and (2) interfered with Davis' business in an arbitrary, discriminatory, capricious and unreasonable manner in violation of his fourteenth amendment right to equal protection of the laws.

It is undisputed that a municipal ordinance in direct and material conflict with a state law of general character or statewide concern is invalid. Marro v. General Treasurer, 108 R.I. 192, 195, 273 A.2d 660, 662 (1971); Opinion to the House of Representatives, 79 R.I. 277, 280, 87 A.2d 693, 696 (1952), and that whether the two so conflict depends on what the Legislature intended when it enacted the statute. Berberian v. Housing Authority, 112 R.I. 771, 775, 315 A.2d 747, 749-50 (1974).

In this case what the Legislature intended is clearly disclosed both in the Waste Management Act itself and in the history of earlier legislation relating to waste...