ISRI News: September/October 2008

September/October 2008

Congressional Fly-in Headlines Summer Board Meeting
Summer may be a time for rest and relaxation for most people, but more than 100 ReMA members were hard at work June 24-27 at the association's leadership and board meetings in Washington, D.C. ReMA's third annual congressional fly-in was the event's centerpiece, with members holding about 175 meetings with their representatives and senators—nearly twice as many as last year's fly-in. In all, ReMA members met with elected officials from 36 states, including six states not covered in previous ReMA fly-ins. For an in-depth look at the fly-in, see "Speaking Up for Scrap."

In addition to the fly-in, the summer governance event included a full slate of meetings of ReMA's committees, commodity divisions, and board of directors, which approved a series of new projects to begin this summer.

• ISRI will upgrade its Theft Alert system, with the goal of making it automated and more user-friendly. As part of this project, the board approved funds to hire a new employee to focus on outreach to law enforcement officials to expand the scope and effectiveness of ReMA's efforts to combat materials theft.

• ISRI will consider performing a lifecycle analysis to better understand the recycling industry's role in mitigating climate change, with the goal of documenting the industry's contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

• Per the request of the membership committee, ReMA will create new membership plaques to distribute to all members, beginning with the 2009 renewal season.

• The communications committee, which is overseeing the association's image campaign, received funds for message testing and development of a microsite linked to ReMA's Web site designed specifically for those outside the industry looking for information about scrap recycling.

  In other decisions, the board confirmed appointments to several ReMA governance bodies.

• The board of the Recycling Research Foundation now comprises Manny Bodner of Bodner Metal & Iron Corp. (Houston), who serves as chair; David Borsuk of Sadoff Iron & Metal (Fond du Lac, Wis.); Paul Brenner of Brenner Recycling (Hazleton, Pa.); Michael Eisner of Lakeside Scrap Metals (Cleveland); Randy Goodman of OmniSource Southeast (Spartanburg, S.C.); Frank Goulding of Newell Recycling (East Point, Ga.); Benjamin Harvey of E.L. Harvey & Sons (Westborough, Mass.); Joanna Jiampietro of Utica Alloys (Utica, N.Y.); Jim Lawrence of ELG Metals (Houston); Neil LeBlanc of Caterpillar (Peoria, Ill.); Stephen Moss of Stanton A. Moss (Bryn Mawr, Pa.); and Lois Young of Skagit River Steel & Recycling (Burlington, Wash.).

• The board appointed Matt Levine of Leonard Levine Metals Corp. (Highland Park, Ill.) and Marvin Siegel of OmniSource Southeast (Spartanburg, S.C.) to the executive committee.

• John Chilcott of Earth Protection

Services (Phoenix) is interim chair of the association's new Electronics Division; Phil Fava of PK Metals (Coram, N.Y.) is interim vice chair; and Joe Clayton of Synergy Recycling (Mayodan, N.C.) is interim second vice chair.

The ReMA board also approved several measures related to general association business.

• At the request of the Council of Chapter Presidents, ReMA amended its bylaws to allow chapters to set their membership dues in an amount not to exceed $1,000. The previous cap of $250 had been in place for more than 20 years.

• The government affairs committee and materials theft task force requested changes to ReMA's Recommended Practices and Procedures for Minimizing the Risks of Purchasing Stolen Scrap Materials. ReMA staff made slight changes to ensure that paper was better represented in the document, such as including examples of paper in its prohibited materials section.

• The board approved ReMA's newest transportation safety resources—a Transportation Safety Manual, which provides recommended practices for driver safety, accident and injury reduction, and DOT compliance in the scrap recycling industry, and a Drivers Handbook, which provides safety guidance for drivers.

• The operations committee recommended and received approval to establish a formal alliance with OSHA to provide data to the agency on the hazards that the scrap industry faces and to seek input from the group on the best ways to resolve those hazards.

• The board approved expanding the association's Safety Council to include environmental issues as well. The group, now the ReMA Safety and Environmental Council, will address issues of concern to both safety and environmental professionals in the recycling industry.

• The board asked the ReMA staff to investigate the feasibility of a trade mission to Southeast Asia, including establishing a dialogue with consumers in the region as well as the U. S. Department of Commerce's International Trade Administration. The staff will offer a full report and recommendation for consideration at the board's fall meeting.

ReMA's summer governance meeting also featured guest speaker Chuck Todd, political director for NBC News, who shared his views on the presidential campaign and politics in Washington.

The final ReMA governance meeting in 2008 is scheduled for Oct. 14-17 in San Francisco. For more information and registration details, visit www.isri.org.  

ISRI Opposes Effort to Block Bank Credit for Scrap Exports
ReMA sent a letter Aug. 11 to the Export-Import Bank of the United States opposing an attempt by the American Scrap Coalition to block the bank from extending credit for the sale and export of $24 million of shredded scrap to Turkey. ASC argued that the Export-Import Bank should deny the request for a bank credit limit by ReMA member Sims Group Global Trade Corp. because the United States is facing a steel scrap crisis, both in terms of supply for domestic consumption and rising prices caused by increasing exports.

ReMA's letter noted that recent independent research indicates there is enough scrap to meet domestic manufacturers' demand for the foreseeable future, with scrap available both domestically and internationally. On the issue of rising prices for steel scrap, ReMA pointed out that the price of finished steel produced by the U.S. steel industry has increased at an even faster rate. Further, despite increased raw material costs, the U.S. steel industry continues to enjoy record profit margins, with operations running at or near capacity and with prices passed on to the manufacturers of goods such as cars, appliances, and machinery.

Denying the bank credit limit to Sims Group Global Trade would set a "dangerous precedent," ReMA stated, "especially in light of the Export-Import Bank's stated mission to promote exports and its previous approvals of support for the export of scrap materials." The U.S. government should—and consistently has—facilitated scrap exports because of the significant trade surplus created by the U.S. scrap industry, ReMA said. The association also asserted that restricting steel scrap exports is not an appropriate mechanism for addressing ASC's concerns about dumped rebar imports from Turkey.

Contact Robin Wiener at 202/662-8512 or robinwiener@isri.org.  

Bateman Joins ReMA Safety Staff Joe Bateman joined ReMA in late July as safety and training manager. In this new post, he will reinvigorate ReMA's Scrap Safety Blueprint program and expand the association's safety outreach efforts. Most recently Bateman worked as regional manager of health, safety, environment, and transportation for the Southeast operations of PSC Metals (Nashville, Tenn.). Prior to that, he was safety director for Mervis Iron & Metal (Danville, Ill.). Since 2005, he also has chaired ReMA's Safety Council. Reach Bateman, who is based in Nashville, at 202/716-3702 or joebateman@isri.org.

ISRI Lauds Success Stories in Materials Theft Fight
In the ongoing fight against materials theft, several ReMA members have gained the upper hand against thieves. In the past six months, for instance, OmniSource Corp.'s work with local law enforcement agencies has resulted in the arrests of 161 individuals suspected of possessing and attempting to sell stolen materials. OmniSource is cooperating with law enforcement officials on 165 additional cases in which information gathered during initial investigations resulted in police follow-up.

Ocala Recycling (Ocala, Fla.)—another success story—has provided information to its local and county law enforcement officials that, as of mid-August, had led to the arrests of 44 individuals suspected of selling stolen materials. The company credits its success partly to its Team BOLO, a group of 17 employees trained to "be on the lookout" for suspicious transactions and individuals. In addition, Ocala Recycling, the Marion County [Fla.] Sheriff's Office, and the Ocala Police Department each have a point person to manage the material theft issue, which has enhanced communications among the groups and led to arrests of suspects.

Other ReMA members are achieving similar success across North America, and the association has compiled these accounts into a document to help other scrap recycling companies form their own responses. Find Scrap Recycling Industry's Outreach/Coalition Success Stories at www.isri.org/theft. For more information, or to share what your own company is doing to combat materials theft, contact Bruce Savage at 202/662-8510 or brucesavage@isri.org. 

Introducing the ISRI Broadsheet ReMA members now can benefit from the association's latest e-mail publication—the ISRI Broadsheet. The monthly Broadsheet draws together regularly reported government data to provide a closer look at several scrap commodity price and industry-related indicators. The newsletter presents the data in a way that, in most cases, allows direct comparison of the performance of various commodities and specific components of the economy over the past 12 months and the past five years. Other than a few general economic and employment statistics, all of the Broadsheet's indexes are producer price indexes. These indexes capture price movements prior to the retail level and therefore may foreshadow subsequent price changes for businesses and consumers. Recipients of ReMA's Monday Report and Friday Report automatically receive the ISRI Broadsheet, but all ReMA members are eligible to sign up for the new publication. Contact Tom Crane at 202/662-8536 or tomcrane@isri.org or Bob Garino at 202/662-8542 or bobgarino@isri.org.

ISRI in Brief

• ReMA's radiation task force met with the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors in mid-August to lay out a strategy for improving communication between regulators and the scrap recycling industry. Both groups agreed that recyclers typically are the victims, not the lawbreakers, when they receive radioactive materials and that, as such, they deserve regulatory protection. Both groups agreed to implement a radioactive scrap theft alert system and open their meetings to representatives from the other group. In the short term, CRCPD agreed to provide a peer review for the upcoming ReMA radiation training program, which will be previewed at the ReMA Safety and Environmental Council meeting in November and formally launched at ReMA's 2009 convention in Las Vegas.

  Contact John Gilstrap at 202/662-8515 or johngilstrap@isri.org.

• ISRI held a materials theft summit in Washington, D.C., in late July with representatives from 13 associations and other stakeholders that have a vital interest in reducing such thefts. The participants reviewed how materials thefts are affecting each industry, with the goal of understanding each industry's roles and responsibilities in addressing the problem and ultimately identifying ways to collaborate to tackle the problem. The group agreed on the importance of maintaining a dialogue on this issue and establishing a more formal coalition to explore areas of cooperation. Participating groups included the Aluminum Association, American Copper Council, American Public Power Association, Beer Institute, International Association of Chiefs of Police, International Dairy Foods Association, National Association of Home Builders, National Crime Prevention Council, National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, National Sheriffs' Association, Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning Contractors' National Association, U.S. Department of Justice, and U.S. Telecommunications Association. Another 10 associations were invited but unable to attend this initial meeting: the American Farm Bureau, Associated General Contractors Association, Council of State Governments, Edison Electric Institute, National Association of Attorneys General, National Association of Counties, National Conference of State Legislators, National Governors Association, National League of Cities, and U.S. Conference of Mayors. •

Summer may be a time for rest and relaxation for most people, but more than 100 ReMA members were hard at work June 24-27 at the association's leadership and board meetings in Washington, D.C. ReMA's third annual congressional fly-in was the event's centerpiece, with members holding about 175 meetings with their representatives and senators—nearly twice as many as last year's fly-in.