Winters Brothers Buys Transfer Station, ends Galante Ownership in Danbury

The purchase of the Danbury transfer station was announced Wednesday with an audible sigh of relief from buyer Joe Winters, Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton, Ridgefield First Selectman Rudy Marconi (Vice Chairman of HRRA) and Dave Dunleavy, a manager at the White Street facility.

Winters, who sold the family's Long Island trash hauling business about four years ago, said he worked on his golf game during that brief retirement, and then saw his children growing up and wanted to get back to work. He visited Danbury a year ago, liked what he saw, and told Boughton he'd buy the White Street facility in three months.

Boughton said it took two years, and Winters said it certainly didn't take three months.

"We're going to invest millions," Winters said.

He is planning to install a second scale as soon as the city issues the necessary permits. That will cut the wait time for trash haulers.

He plans to add a recycling effort at the construction and demolition building to begin recycling wood, concrete and metal from constrution waste. He plans to increase recycling in the municipal solid waste building and in the recycling building itself.

To help accomplish that, Winters Brothers are delivering thousands of 96-gallon garbage cans to their customers. Each customer will get a green can for trash and blue can for recycling. People can put all their recycling (glass, plastic, metal, cardboard) into the blue can for what is called "single stream recycling."

"When people think Winters Brothers, I want them to think recycling," Winters said.

"This has been a long time coming," Boughton said. "We met two years ago, and he said it would take three months."

"I did say three months," Winters said.

Boughton and Winters said the city and company are now negotiating a deal over how the firm will operate in Danbury. The deal will include a "host benefit fee," which industry-wide averages $1 per ton through the door. That figure is being negotiated. The deal will include Winters paying for the city's annual trash collection days, Clean City Danbury and the Hazardous Waste Collection Day.

"This will be a public-private partnership," Boughton said, and Stephen Bull, president of the Greater Danbury Chamber of Commerce said it will be good for Danbury and the region, as long as Winters continues to hire more people and invest in new equipment and in the transfer station.

On display during the announcement were two of the company's three new combination trash and recycling trucks that have an automated system for picking up the special 96-gallon tote garbage cans. Each Winters Brothers customer will receive the new larger garbage cans, one for trash and one for recycling. Each truck cost about $300,000, Winters said.

Before the U.S Marshal Service took over the transfer station and its 25-related companies, the trash empire was owned by James Galante of New Fairfield. Galante was arrested for racketeering in 2006 and he was convicted in 2008.

Galante pleaded guilty on June 3, 2008, to racketeering conspiracy. As of that date, Galante pleaded guilty to three charges that arose from a 117-count indictment of Galante and people he worked with, including members of the Genovese family of La Cosa Nostra, according to the federal indictment.

The indictment said Matthew Ianniello, known as "The Horse," was a member of the Genovese family of La Cosa Nostra, who conspired with Galante and Galante's partner, Thomas Milo, another associate of the Genovese Organized Crime Family. What they did, the indictment said, was agree to stifle competition among trash haulers. That had the impact of rising prices for consumers and commercial businesses.

The indictment said organized crime enforced the system, and collected tribute payments because they kept out competition. People who tried to break into the hauling business were attacked. Their drivers and employees were assaulted. Their equipment was vandalized. They were subjected to predatory pricing. They were locked out of the transfer station. This system was in effect from "at least the mid-1980s," the indictment said.

As part of his plea deal, Galante forfeited his ownership in 25 trash hauling companies, his property at 530 Main Street North, Southbury, six racing cars, a Featherlite Trailer used to haul racing cars, $448,153.10 in cash, and he agreed to withdraw from all participation in the trash industry in the U.S.