News
A lawsuit on behalf of Goldberg Kohn client Southside Recycling is featured in "General Iron Turns to Cook Co. Court, Says it Followed Rules, Yet City Refuses Permit for New Scrap Metal Recycling Plant," published in the July 9, 2021, edition of the Cook County Record.
The article concerns General Iron's continuing legal fight against the city of Chicago for allegedly violating the city’s own rules and the law in dragging its feet in awarding the permit the company needs to operate a new metal recycling facility on Chicago’s southeast side.
"[A] business that has spent $80 million creating the most environmentally conscious metal recycling plant in the country, must be able to rely on a government that follows the law and its agreements.”
Operating under the name Southside Recycling, General Iron's newly filed complaint in Cook County Circuit Court seeks a court order requiring the city to issue the operating permit that it says it is owed under both an agreement with City Hall and under city rules. Goldberg Kohn principal David Chizewer, who is representing Southside Recycling, wrote in the complaint:
“(Southside Recycling) has jumped through every possible hoop, has supplied every last piece of information, has cooperated through every City delay, and has more than satisfied every permitting requirement...Whether you are an individual citizen or a business that has spent $80 million creating the most environmentally conscious metal recycling plant in the country, you must be able to rely on a government that follows the law and its agreements.”
General Iron first filed suit against the city in May. In that complaint, the company similarly accused the city of violating its rules and the law, making a political decision to bow to the will of community and environmental activists opposed to General Iron’s project, in general. And those legal violations, the company said, amounted to an unconstitutional taking of its property by the city.
Southside Recycling had previously stated that it would "immediately seek a prompt ruling in state court ordering the city to issue the permit, based on the city’s broken promises and the fact that we have met every requirement imposed by the city’s own rules, which businesses have a right to rely upon. Despite multiple attempts since early May to understand how and when the city intends to proceed, the additional analysis that it is purportedly intending to perform remains undefined and the timing undetermined. It is truly damaging to the environment and the local metal recycling market that the best recycling facility in the country is on hold while the only other shredder in Chicago continues to operate without any pollution controls, but we will continue to fight for our right to service our suppliers and responsibly perform the critical service of metal recycling for Chicago."
