This agreement provides funding from the infrastructure investment and jobs act (IIJA)

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) was awarded a $531,690 Cooperative Agreement from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling (SWIFR) Grant Program (CFDA 66.920). The purpose of the award is to enhance DEC's efforts to support long-term planning and data collection needs to demonstrate progress toward national recycling and food loss/waste reduction goals, and advance a circular economy for materials, as well as support state-led implementation of plans to advance post-consumer materials management.

The key activities funded under this award include upgrading DEC's Solid Waste Information Management System (SWIMS) to integrate with the existing NFORM electronic reporting platform. This will improve the speed and efficiency of DEC's solid waste and recycling data management processes. The funding will support developing new data reporting formats, guidance materials, and training for the regulated community to utilize the enhanced SWIMS-NFORM system. The expected outcomes include improved data quality, increased utilization of the SWIFR program, and reduced staff time required to process annual reports from solid waste management facilities.

EPA's solid waste infrastructure for recycling (swifr) grants for states and territories will fund activities that support long-term planning and data collection needs to demonstrate progress toward the national recycling goal and food loss and waste reduction goal and advance a circular economy for materials, as well as support the state-led implementation of plans to advance post-consumer materials management. The purpose of this award is to enhance the new york state department of environmental conservation's (nysdec's) efforts to meet the swifr grants elements. Nysdec will upgrade its solid waste and recycling data processing capacity by tying its solid waste information management system (swims) data base directly to DEC's existing electronic reporting system, nform, which will significantly enhance the speed and efficiency of the state's data management processes. The purpose of this award is to enhance the new york state's efforts to meet the swifr grants elements. Activities:timeline/milestones: october 2023 - december 2023: - establish workplan approval with NYS oits - establish contract for swim/nforms integration january 2024 - march 2024: - integrate first phase of e-annual report forms with associated fields in swims - add fields to swims field to match annual report data, if necessary april 2024 - december 2024: - revise data processing procedures, as necessary - revise e-annual report form, as necessary - integrate second phase of e-annual report forms with associated data fields in swims - add data fields to swims, as necessary - draft user guidance for regulated community january 2025 - april 2025 - publicize availability of e-annual report forms - post user guidance documents - provide training webinar for regulated community april 2025 - august 2025 - process received annual reports - identify percentage of reporting swmfs that used e-form - seek feedback from e-form users - evaluate annual report data process compared to pre-e-form system september 2025 - december 2025 - use knowledge gained from evaluations and feedback to modify nforms-swims integrations, as necessary - revise data processing procedures, as necessary - revise e-annual report form, as necessary - integrate third phase of e-annual report forms with associated data fields in swims - add data fields to swims, as necessary - draft user guidance for regulated community january 2026 - march 2026 - publicize availability of e-annual report forms - update and post user guidance documents, as necessary - provide updated training webinar for regulated community april 2026 - september 2026 - finalize enhance data management processing within swims - develop new data reports for publishing and distribution of solid waste disposal and recycling data subrecipient:no subawards are included in this assistance agreement.outcomes:the anticipated deliverables include - guidance to regulated community to support use of nform platform - new formats for distributing solid waste and recycling data to EPA, regulated community, and public - identification of best practices - updates to program content the expected outcomes include: - improved quality of data received via automated data field parameters implemented in integration - established networks for information exchange - increased utilization of swifr program - increased percentage of swmfs submitting annual reports via web-based annual report portal (nform) - reduced staff time used to key in swmf annual report data - increase the functionality of swims to process and finalize swmf annual report data the intended beneficiaries include staff at the nysdec, staff at NYS solid waste management facilities and the entire solid waste regulated community, a