September 10, 2009 State Programs Group Call

Agenda

  • Lucy Doroshko, MI
  • Katie McKibben, OK
  • Joseph
  • Tom Heil, KY
  • Lynn Rubinstein, Northeast

Recycling Council (NERC)

  • Wendy Okasaki, HI
  • Enid Mitnik, ME
  • Kathy Kawala, OR
  • Candice Bias, MO
  • Garth Hinkle, MN
  • Carole Cifrino, ME
  • Liz Stone, RI
  • Chester Sergent, NV
  • Stan Baum, NYC
  • Katie Spence, IN
  • Tom Metzner, CT
  • Sarah Murray, WI
  • Jason Linnell, NCER
  • Iasia Ward, NCER
  • Heather Smith, NCER

  • Introductions

Jason Linnell welcomed the group to the call and gave an overview of the agenda.

  • Highlights from State Updates

Jason noted that there were a number of new developments in the State Update document and recommended all take a look and send along any further updates that can be posted to the website.

Additional updates:

Garth MN- going through the recycler reports for year 2, preliminary totals show 5.75 lbs per capita collected in the second program year (July 08- June 09).

Kathy OR –January 1 2010 disposal ban kicks in and DEQ is getting out the word

Stan NYC – Some of the preliminary deadlines for filings as part of the industry lawsuit were recently pushed back. DSNY will not require manufacturer plans until 30 days after judge decision.

  • Electronics Recycling Coordination Clearinghouse

Over the past three weeks small group of state representatives along with NCER and NERC has met on a series of conference calls to discuss the details of the previously discussed Electronics Recycling Coordination Clearinghouse. The group discussed three main topics – governance, activities, and funding. The result of these discussion were distributed in three documents discussed on the call below.

  • Draft Bylaws

Questions:

- Katie from Missouri- why does the definition including “financing” for electronics recycling laws? We were trying to add a distinction between a study committees or disposal bans and more comprehensive electronics recycling legislation.

- Kathy from Oregon- how similar are the bylaws to NERC? Lynn answers they are not similar. Only 1 vote per state is the same. The fiscal year is the same. Developed before there was a relationship with NERC. They are not designed from the same template. However, they are almost identical to the bylaws for TPCH

- Kathy what kinds of nonbinding decisions might be made? Jason answered that they would be decisions about which projects ERCC takes on and not how a certain needs to implement specific provisions.

  • Member Services

Under the Basic Level:

There will be the opportunity for non members to participate in some activities.

There will be a listserv for members for questions and other discussion topics

There will be voting member only discussions.

Outreach opportunities will be available to educate the public

Website would be open to public (apart from member-only portion) and would contain general information about states, reports, return share data

For members only- Downloadable list of manufactures contact information, minutes from meetings, information about quarterly and annual reports, etc.

Additional Services will be a separate fee level.

Joint online manufacturer registration service.

Joint purchasing and analysis if needed, of market research data.

Questions/Comments:

Katie from IN- have you talked to manuf about their interest in the clearinghouse/manuf registration. Jason answered yes and no. There has been a demo and yes there is an interest.

  • Funding Structure

Used TPCH Categories as a start, but added an additional population level for bigger states

Questions/Comments:

  • WI- hoping to have the law passed, as an affiliate member 1000 would be kind of high.

Jason: Are there any members at TCPH that are affiliate members and do not have legislation? Lynn: There are no members who do not have legislation. This may be lowered since there are several states with study committees

  • Is the manufacturer registration site a cost or revenue? What does it do? What is it?

The way it is shown on the budget document is the estimated cost for the first year. That cost would be split by the members choosing to participate and should eventually produce revenue.

The NCER combined all known and available state manufacturer registration forms online, and it allows manufacturers to input common items that are requested in each state, and then the other state-specific details.

  • Will the states have to use this form or get rid of their own forms?

No it is a way for the manufacturers to register in one place.

  • Is the cost shown for the manuf reg site per state or total?

It is a total that would be divided among the participating states/industry members. That would be 5 states not 25,000 for each state.

  • Kathy- this is a great idea when will we launch this/ will it be under the umbrella of the clearinghouse>

Jason- looking into January 1 for initial start of member services. The activities have been currently covered under a grant that is running out at the end of September. We are hoping that most of the activities will be covered under the clearing house and that there will still be a public website for the data that we have been providing. The ERCC would be one project of the NCER. NERC would be the administrator of the ERCC and complete a separate agreement with NCER to manage the member services and activities.

  • What would change once the ERCC is up and running

All of the current NCER State Programs Group activities would be member services under the ERCC: activities would include these calls, background data gathering of the comparisons across the states, and information sharing. There will be no funding for these activities separate from ERCC, and therefore there may be a time lag between October 1 and the end of the year.

  • IN-Starting January 1 will they still get to participate without being a founding member since their monies do not come in until April?

It has been discussed and the state may be able to participate and be invoiced for payment at a later date, on an individual basis.

  • Liz RI- is there any way that the states could help with getting funding for the program in the interim until the Clearinghouse is up and running?

Will look into it and get back.

  • Update on manufacturer registration website feedback

One demo done, the feedback was good, just wanted to make sure that the states will accept the registrations submitted this way. They liked being able to fill out the common items once and have the system will set up reminder(email) for them to go back in and submit for whatever states are left according to registrations deadlines. We plan on doing a few more demos will send comments to the group about the feedback we received. New version of the registration system with changes suggested on our last states’ call will be sent out soon.

  • Info Sharing Manufacturer changes, bankruptcies, etc

Enid-Sceptre Technologies (dissolved) and Sceptre Inc claim they are separate. They are contesting CRTs they pay for the flat panels, does anyone have any information of assets? Sceptre Inc is not supplying any information. On paper most everything seems the same. There has been a transfer of trademarks on paper but not of assets. How would trademark states handle that?

All trademarks have been put out as an interest in a bank loan. But the last known owner was Sceptre Inc.

Came up because of the Komodo brand name is not utilized by the new company. But they use Sceptre and it is actually owned by a different company.

This may be a new way that companies are trying to get out historic brand return obligations.

Circuit City is liquidating and will be gone, but Systemax bought and is now operating Circuitcity.com website.

CTX is gone, the foreign entities are not responding to anything.

Still trying to track down Nagamechi, Atari and nationally owned Emerson Radio Corporation (only remaining with us office).

Emerson is also tied in with Olevia (brought the trademark only) not sure what they are going to do with it, supposed to let Maine know when they activate the brand. When a company buys the brand name in Maine they are not automatically responsible for historic brands, waiting on Syntax Brillian to go through liquidation.

Silicon Graphics inc. is almost of chapter 11 according to (new name is) Silicon Graphics international

Polaroid still tied up in chapter 11, the brand name was sold but still waiting to find out what company that is. Will likely incorporate in Minnesota. It was sold to an asset liquidator so waiting to see where they park it.

Liz from RI- how is Radio shack cooperating with some of the other states with registering. Enid said they’re very slow. It is very common. Keep contacting for a response. Registered in some form in ME, WA, OR, WV HI, MD,

  • Market share data updates

Is anyone getting/acquiring market share data?

NCER is working with Minnesota using the isuppli data. Working on getting the avg weights. Some of the product categories avg weights have gone down on the market side.

CT needs to get market share data but IDC is not doing TV’s anymore. They may be able to get them to reconsider, CT will ask.

Carol e- manufactures have to give previous 5 years on annual reports but the data looks incomplete. For last year’s data we may be able to put something out to show the breakdown of three product categories.

IL has another approach, since retailers and the Manufacturers of TV still have to report when comparing the reports for market share it seems that the information is pretty accurate.

  • NERC Fall Conference meeting

Meeting of any state electronics recycling representative will be at 8AM on Wed, October 28th. Will be getting out documents to states to get feedback. See

Lynn – The NERC conference will be looking at some energy issues and recycling, and looking at recycler certification as well as how processors are embracing those opportunities.

  • Action Items
  1. Finalize documents with input from group
  2. Draft letter of request for commitments to join ERCC with final documents, including deadline for responses
  3. Complete more manufacturer demos
  4. Send link to registration site with link to state representatives once new version is deployed
  5. Send draft report with older market data (completed)
  6. Send copy of upcoming E-Scrap News article by NCER on market/return share (completed)