No ‘constitutional injuries’ to CE companies can be assessed unti...
No “constitutional injuries” to CE companies can be assessed until after manufacturers and New York City “come together over specific plans” for collecting and recycling e- waste, said the New York State Association for Solid Waste Management and other…
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groups, in an amicus brief filed Dec. 1 and posted Tuesday that backs the city in its legal fight against CEA and the ITI Council. The court can’t evaluate makers’ claims that New York City’s e-waste program and its direct collection requirement will cause them irreparable harm “before some practical plan for collection and recovery has been presented and either approved or rejected by the city,” said the brief, which was signed by five others, including the governments of San Francisco and Portland, Ore. “The doctrine of constitutional avoidance requires the courts to refrain upon ruling upon questions of constitutional law when such rulings can be avoided, or narrowed through an administrative process,” it said. CE makers filed their lawsuit July 24, days before they were required to file elaborate e-waste collection plans with the city. If the court sides with the city and turns down CE makers’ request for a preliminary injunction, the city has agreed not to require the collection plans to be filed for 30 days after the ruling. Under the city’s e-waste law, the submission of e-waste collection and recycling plans, “and the reaction of city officials to those submitted plans, will identify the precise constitutional issues requiring resolution, if any such issues remain,” the brief said. “A ruling by this court that prevents that process from occurring will address constitutional issues that may not ultimately require resolution, and will almost certainly require a broader ruling than the developed facts will ultimately require.”