The COMPOST Act in Search of Co-Sponsors

Ten chapter coordinators and more than 50 USCC members are hitting the virtual and real "streets” this month to find co-sponsors for The COMPOST Act, the bicameral bill introduced July 16 proposing more than $2 billion over 10 years for compost facility development of all sizes and recognizing finished compost as a fundable conservation practice for farming.
 
This certainly didn’t happen overnight! The backstory is that the USCC has worked toward this for years, and more recently with a few core organizations that grew into the Composting Infrastructure Coalition to develop relationships with Capitol Hill congressional staff from Members who are interested in composting, soil health, food scrap diversion and related topics. We tip our hats especially to the Plant Based Products Council, which has shared their lobbying capacity and expertise with all of the organizations and has put real expertise and speed into the process.

Rep. Julia Brownley of California liked what we had to offer, and we thank her for The bill that came introducing the original COMPOST (stands for Cultivating Organics Matter through the Promotion Of Sustainable Technologies) Act in 2020 (see: https://juliabrownley.house.gov/brownley-and-pingree-introduce-bill-to-support-composting-for-agriculture-sector/). The bill has two focuses:

1) Compost as a Conservation Practice: The bill gives conservation practice status to compost production and on-farm application by the USDA and its conservation arm, NRCS, so that farmers receive financial assistance for this soil health practice through the farm bill’s conservation programs. If you’ve ever been frustrated that no-till, cover crops and other practices that receive federal financial support are discussed in farm soil health meetings but not compost, you know why this is important!

2) Infrastructure Funding: The bill provides a sustained source of funds for infrastructure for composting and after several months of discussion, the proposal for $2 billion for 10 years ($200 million annually). Projects can be selected for grants (private sector only qualifies for these by partnership with a municipality/nonprofit/farm) or loans (private sector qualifies), and are capped at $5 million per project with matching fund requirements (see table). A "carveout” of 25% annually for applications from backyard and small scale composting projects was reserved.

The bill sets up prioritization for grant awards in areas including handling of source-separated organics; serving areas without compost program/facility access for foodscrap composting; environmental; plans for best management practices and high quality compost products; applications from small and diverse businesses (such as minority, woman, veteran owned or other programs of businesses led by people of color); and projects that provide opportunities for inclusiveness and living wages; serving low-income/disadvantaged communities or serving environmental justice goals.

USCC’s chapters have swung into action, working to set up meetings in the coming month to explain and ask co-sponsorship of the bill by members of Congress from their states. To learn how to get involved with the chapters or to lobby in a non-chapter state, read the article below.

It actually has been quite some time we’ve been working on this—USCC staff found this 2019 photo from my meeting with Senator Cory Booker’s staff.

All I can say is—I’m excited to see this idea finally come to fruition.