ANALYSIS OF CURRENT CITY REGULATIONS PERTAINING

UNMANNED DONATION BOXES IN SELECT CITIES OF THE

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA

Prepared for:

City of South San Francisco

Small Recycling Facility

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SMALL RECYCLING FACILITY

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Intro: 4

Preexisting conditions in South San Francisco: 4

Examples of different approaches from other cities in the Bay Area: 5

Oakland: 5

Concord: 6

San Jose: 8

Pleasanton: 9

Conclusion and Recommendations: 10

Attachments: 12

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INTRO: The purpose of this work is to give the reader an overview of the existing conditions for

placement of unattended donation boxes throughout the Greater San Francisco Bay

Area. The focus is solely on small recycling facilities, specifically unmanned donation

boxes for collection of used clothing and shoes. Campus California TG operated a

clothing donation program using this type of containers in South San Francisco, until

recently it had been brought to our attention that there are very specific and strict

requirements regulating this kind of operation in the municipal code. It is not within our

means to comply with a part of these requirements; especially the required permit fee

of $3000 per each location is just unrealistic for a small non-profit organization like ours.

Therefore we were forced to remove all the donation boxes located in the city (a total of

13) and since we collected over 120 000lbs of clothing in 2008, this will also be a setback

for the city’s efforts towards increasing the amount of recyclable materials that are not

being sent to the landfill.

We feel it would be appropriate time for South San Francisco to consider a change in the

said part of the municipal code that would make it easier for organizations or individuals

to engage in community based recycling initiatives in this city.

PREEXISTING CONDITIONS IN SOUTH SAN

FRANCISCO: The municipal code of the city of South San Francisco currently requires for all recycling

facilities except reverse vending machines to obtain a use permit and describes the

different criteria that such facility has to meet. It also provides the planning director,

planning commission and the city council with the right to relax these standards or

impose stricter ones if necessary.

The cost of an application for a use permit is currently around $3000, in addition to the

roughly $1000 price for a donation box itself. According to the California Welfare and

Institution Code only registered non-profit can engage in soliciting donations of personal

property. Unfortunately the financial requirements for the Use Permit are so high that

no small community organization is able to afford them. The result is that even though

the operating conditions prescribed in the code are sensible and assure a safe and

nuisance free service for the community, in reality there is no way anybody will actually

be able to place donation boxes in the city.

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EXAMPLES OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES FROM OTHER

CITIES IN THE BAY AREA:

Berkeley, Richmond, San Rafael, Pittsburg, Dublin (and others) – cities with the

remnants of the original federal “standard municipal code”. All of these require a

variation of Use Permit or Administrative Use Permit with the associated fees up to

$1500 per each proposed location. There are no donation boxes for clothes and shoes

present in these cities.

San Francisco, Alameda, Daly City, Oakland, and Vallejo – These municipalities did not

have the use permit requirements in their codes or have chosen to remove them at

some point. Instead they require organizations like ours to comply with the general

safety and public right –of-way rules (i.e. no encroachment on public places). These

rules are not different from the requirements for operating a small collection facility as

set forth in the existing South San Francisco Code. In addition they usually require us to

keep an updated list of existing locations throughout the city with the planning

department and also show a written permission from a person responsible for the

private property on which the donation box is located. The standard form we use is

attached at the end of this document. There are many donation boxes in these cities

and the general population has been very supportive of our efforts as well as the local

business owners permitting us to place the boxes on their premises. In several cities our

targeted density of boxes has been achieved (1box/3-5000 residents) and now we are

focusing only on maintaining the quality of service.

As an example of such a recycling-friendly city; following is the pertaining portion of the

municipal code of:

OAKLAND

8.28.030 Collection of recyclable or organic recyclable

materials.

A. Permits. All persons collecting and transporting recyclables or organic recyclable

material within the city must hold a valid city business license. Recyclers shall be

required to maintain records, in a prescribed format and schedule, documenting

that all recyclables or organic recyclable material that they collect and transport,

less allowable residual, is recycled. Such records shall be maintained in an

auditable form for at least three years, and the city shall have the right to examine

said records upon written request.

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Our organization is maintaining a current business license with the city of Oakland and

regularly submits an updated list of locations with donation boxes to the City

Administrator’s office.

Individual solutions:

Some cities feel that the issue of clothing donation boxes for public use is important

enough to make a special determination by the zoning administrator. It also happens

when a situation needs to be addressed that is not completely covered in the existing

municipal or zoning code. I would like to present the case of Concord in a greater detail

as an example of this approach.

CONCORD

Existing regulations: (excerpt from Concord Municipal Code)

Sec. 82-113. Permit.

(a) Required; issuance; authorized locations. No person shall own, establish, place,

construct, or operate any recycling facility without first obtaining a permit pursuant

to the provisions set forth in this section. The criteria and standards for the

issuance of such a permit shall be set forth in the city policy and procedure

manual. Recycling facilities may be permitted as set forth below:

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

TABLE INSET:

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

*Refers to current zoning classifications and, in the case of PD (Planned District)

zoning, refers to the Land Use Element classifications; e.g., commercial includes

DB, NC, SC; and industrial includes SLI, LI, and PI.

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

Type of Facility Location* Permit Required Reverse vending machine(s) Commercial or

industrial

None required; allowed use subject to Policy and

Procedure No. 141, Recycling Facilities--Criteria and

Standards

Small collection Commercial or

industrial

Zoning Administrator permit

Large collection Commercial or

industrial

Use permit

Processing Industrial Use permit

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Notification to property owners within 300 feet of a proposed site for a small

collection recycling facility shall not be required, except in those particular cases

where such notification is determined by city staff to be necessary.

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 88-8)

(b) Exemption for small collection facilities of nonprofit organizations.

(1) Any small collection facility which is maintained by and for the sole benefit of a

nonprofit institution is not required to obtain a permit if:

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

a. Such facility is in existence and operation on October 1, 1987; or

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

b. Such facility is located on the same site as the sponsoring nonprofit institution.

(Code 1965, § 5802; Ord. No. 87-41)

(2) Small collection facilities for nonprofit organizations which cannot comply with

the criteria in subsection (1) directly above may be permitted by the Deputy City

Manager/Community Development and Public Works or his designee based upon

compliance determination. Such action may include reasonable conditions related

to the recycling site, its operation, etc.

We can see that some of the provisions are similar to the existing South San Francisco

code but there are some important differences:

First of all small recycling facilities require a “Zoning administrator permit”, as opposed

to the Use Permit for a Large recycling facility; and therefore the process of establishing

one is significantly less complicated (and less costly) than a full Use Permit would be,

while the administrator still maintains the right to review and approve each location and

impose additional requirements if necessary.

The notification to property owners within 300 ft of proposed location is generally not

required (we have 12 locations in Concord and in none of these instances did the

administrator deem it necessary) since a placement of a 12sq ft donation box on one

property generally has no influence on the neighboring properties as opposed to i.e. a

160+ sq ft manned donation trailer.

Another important provision is the exemption of a nonprofit organization from the

permit process, resp. the possibility for the Community development or Public Works to

determine the individual conditions under which a particular organization will be

allowed to operate. This allows the city to retain control over the placement and

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maintenance of any donation boxes in the city. In practice the city set forth certain

conditions concerning the placement and service of donation boxes; similar to the ones

that are present in South San Francisco municipal code. In addition the city approves

each prospective location before the box is placed. This lets us resolve any particular

issues regarding individual locations, but in fact we haven’t had any problems or

complaints since the system was established (April 2008). The full version of the

Administrative Approval by the City of Concord is attached to this document.

In November 2008 the city of San Leandro issued a determination based on the

experiences from Concord; adopting basically the same rules for placing Donation boxes

as the city of Concord.

SAN JOSE

The city of San Jose has a very simple and streamlined process for establishing a small

recycling facility. It requires an Administrative permit that comes with no fee for a non-

profit organization and there is a possibility of permitting multiple locations under one

application provided that they are similar in nature. There is a $180 environmental

review fee associated with the application that stays the same regardless of the actual

number of locations. The application also has a list of conditions attached that the

applicant has to comply with. These are very similar to the requirements existing in the

current South San Francisco code.

There is however one issue with this process that is the reason why there are no

applications for small recycling facility submitted to the city of San Jose. The

permit application absolutely requires the signature of the actual property

owner. This is in fact a much bigger problem than it looks like due to the nature

of properties in the Bay Area. On one side very often the tenants have full

control over what is happening on the property, especially if there is only one

business on the location and it was there for a long time. They have very little

or no contact with their landlord (and in fact they don’t really want to!), but

even if in practice they are fully in control of the premises, they cannot

“authorize” the placement of a box. On the other side the property is often

controlled by a property management company who takes care of the tenants

but they will not “bother” the landlord because of the box nor will they give us

a contact. It is also very common for a landlord to stay abroad, making it nearly

impossible to acquire a signature on the city’s form. It would be much better to

require the signature of the “person with the right to authorize the placement

of a box”, defined as either owner or appointed manager-in-charge. This would

support the existing practice, as the boxes are always removed if requested by

either the tenant or the property owner or if either of these change, regardless

of who gave the original permission. According to our experience the

owner/manager in charge of the hosting business always knows if he/she has

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the authority to allow the placement of the box or they have to seek the

permission from the landlord/property manager. This permission is almost

always given verbally (over the phone), and all parties always retain the right to

ask for the removal of the box for any reason or no reason at all.

A copy of the Administrative Permit Application for San Jose is attached to this

document.

PLEASANTON

(Excerpt from the municipal code)

9.22.030 Permits required.

No person shall permit the placement, construction, or operation of any recycling

facility without first obtaining a permit pursuant to the provisions set forth in this section.

Recycling facilities may be permitted as set forth in Table 9.22.030. In addition,

recycling facilities may also be allowed in planned unit developments (PUDs) which

allow uses that are conditionally permitted in the commercial or industrial zoning districts

listed in Table 9.22.030, and provided that the applicable permits are obtained pursuant to

the requirements set forth in Table 9.22.030.

Table 9.22.030

Permits Required for Recycling Facilities by Zoning District

The types of recycling facilities listed below shall require the following permits in the

commercial and industrial zoning districts, where the symbol “C” for conditional use

permit, or “AC” for administrative conditional use permit appears in the column beneath

the zoning districts:

Zoning District

Type of Facility CR CR CN CS CF LI IP IG

(m) (p)

Recycling collection

facility, small*

AC AC AC AC AC AC AC

Recycling collection

facility, large

C C C

Recycling processing facility, small

C

Recycling processing

facility, large

C

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4. Any action of the zoning administrator may be appealed to the planning

commission by any affected party pursuant to the requirements of Chapter 18.144. (Ord.

1354 § 1, 1988)

The Administrative Conditional Use Permit as defined in the zoning code requires a $25

fee per each location as well as compliance with a set of rules for operating a small

recycling facility similar to the ones in South San Francisco and other cities.

Unfortunately it also requires the property owner’s signature, and as a result, there are

no donation boxes in Pleasanton.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Based on the materials described above and the years of experiences in operating a

small recycling facility-based donation program, we would like to make the following

recommendations for the Municipal code of South San Francisco:

That the permit requirements for a small recycling facility should be different from

the ones for a large recycling facility.

That only registered 501(c)3 non-profit organizations should be allowed to operate

“donation programs”, in accordance with the CA Welfare and Institutions Code.

That the possibility for a single permit for multiple locations should be established

(with conditions)

That the existing criteria and standards as described in section 20.75.040 South San

Francisco Municipal Code for small recycling facilities are sufficient to ensure the

safe and nuisance free operation.

That the requirement for informing the residents and businesses within 300ft from

the proposed location is dropped unless required for some specific reason.

That the signature of “person in charge” of the property is sufficient on the permit

application instead of the signature of the property owner. This would be possible if

the requirements for a small recycling facility are changed from a Use Permit into

i.e. an administrative approval.

That the collection figures are reported to the appropriate agency/department

designated by the city in order to include the materials into the diversion numbers,

therefore contribute towards the recycling goals set by the city.

According to the EPA an average American discards 78lbs of textiles each year. For

South San Francisco this means a pile of 4,600 000 lbs to be taken care of! Part of these

are textiles soiled or rags beyond any kind of usefulness but most of it still represents a

valuable resource that can and should be diverted from the waste stream. Collecting

used clothing and shoes through unmanned donation boxes placed on various private

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properties is an established and low-cost (precisely speaking cost-free for the city) way

to immediately decrease the volume of garbage going to the landfill. It is very

convenient for the general public to participate, as people deposit their unwanted items

during a regular shopping run or at their favorite gas station. Last but not the least it

also allows non-profit organizations like ours to receive public support for our programs

and earn the money needed for our activities.

LIST OF ATTACHMENTS:

1. Permission to place a Clothing donation box currently used by CCTG

2. Determination letter from the city of San Francisco

3. Condition of Approval from the city of Concord

4. Administrative Permit Application from the city of San Jose

Author: Jan Sako

Campus California TG

(510) 302 7117

jan@cctg.org

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Campus California TG

510 Collier Way, Etna CA 96027

In The Bay Area:

15501-G San Pablo Ave, Richmond, Ca 94806

510 392 3839 main

510 302 7117 Jan

www.cctg.org