Cases

Challenging Red Wing’s Anti-Competitive Trash Cartel
Paul's Industrial Garage and Gibson Sanitation v. City of Red Wing 

IJ-MN Director Lee McGrath and clients, from left, Dale Gibson of Gibson Sanitation and Paul Larson and Dave Deml of Paul's Industrial Garage.

The City of Red Wing, Minn., has unconstitutionally turned its local government into a special interest protected from competition. 

On August 28, 2006, the City Council adopted an ordinance that forces all private commercial trash haulers to use the City incinerator for 10 years, effective January 1, 2007, as a condition of doing business in Red Wing.  The incinerator has been burning up taxpayer money since its inception and the ordinance is nothing more than an unconstitutional attempt to prevent the inefficient government boondoggle from facing much-needed competition.

Local haulers, Paul Larson and Dale Gibson, are not going along with the City’s plan.  They built their hauling businesses into successful enterprises by focusing on what is best for their customers.  Larson and Gibson both believe that the citizens of Red Wing should be free to choose low cost, high quality services, rather than being forced to subsidize the City’s incinerator.

The City cannot forbid the exporting of trash any more than it can stop the exporting of its famous Red Wing shoes or the importing of Wisconsin cheese.  The Minnesota Supreme Court and local courts have ruled that city governments like Red Wing cannot impose controls that discriminate against the interstate movement of trash.  Red Wing and other cities cannot ignore these cases and they cannot ignore law.

The Institute for Justice filed a lawsuit on December 6, 2006, on behalf of Paul Larson and Dale Gibson to defend the rights of entrepreneurs in Minnesota and across the country.  This lawsuit is the fifth case in IJ-Minnesota’s campaign to restore economic liberty as a civil right under both the Minnesota and U.S. Constitutions.