Alachua County seeks to fulfill its promise of organic waste sustainability. But it may not be all sunshine within its chosen compost company.
The county began negotiations with Jacksonville-based Sunshine Organics & Compost June 11 to lay the groundwork for a local compost program, a pointed effort toward the joint city and county Zero Waste Strategic Plan. While the project could solve the county’s organic waste problem, the company and its co-owner come attached to a checkered past of inspection violations, debt and theft.
Sunshine Organics & Compost, co-owned by Michael and Christina Kelcourse, specializes in converting organic waste to either compost or biochar, a solid substance used to improve soil health and absorb carbon emissions.
“Our priorities have stayed the same with wanting to divert food waste from the landfill because of the emission problem but also have now increased to focus on the quality of soil in our country,” Christina Kelcourse said.
And when the county launched a search for someone to take on organic waste management, Michael and Christina Kelcourse answered its call.
The investigation
Founded in 2020, Sunshine Organics & Compost has encountered several roadblocks in an effort to adhere to Florida statutes.
Michael Kelcourse received a Jacksonville solid waste citation in 2021 for conducting “solid waste management” on the current facility property without proper certification. The municipal code violation came over a year before Sunshine Organics & Compost formally received a Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) permit to build and operate its facility.
By March 2023, the FDEP discovered Sunshine Organics & Compost had been running business as usual without seeking state approval, revealing improperly stored organic waste and the absence of a stormwater management pond. The company had also become aware of pre-existing arsenic contamination of the site prior to FDEP investigation, which prevented them from constructing the pond to prevent disturbing or spreading the chemical, according to the June 2024 FDEP final inspection report.
Early into the turn of a new year, an April 2024 odor complaint sparked yet another series of FDEP inspections of the Jacksonville facility. The complaint was later deemed invalid “due to the odor being organic in nature and not posing a health or environmental threat,” according to the final inspection report.
Christina Kelcourse said the complaints were “absolutely ridiculous,” emphasizing the facility’s mild “earthy” smell.
“The public thinks food waste smells,” she said. “We get blamed because of the public perception, not because we actually smell.”
From a cluster of more than 120 homes and businesses within a quarter-mile of the site, multiple Jacksonville residents told The Alligator they had never encountered abnormal odors associated with the company.
However, the FDEP inspections unveiled a lengthy string of unrelated violations.
The new developments included another kickoff to composting prior to approval, material piles far exceeding height regulations, a lack of perimeter roads and unauthorized material compaction. The stormwater pond also remained unfinished from the year before, according to the final inspection report.
Titled FDEP v. Sunshine Organics & Compost LLC and Michael Kelcourse, a consent order was issued Aug. 14. It sidled the facility with a 90-day period to pay $11,750 in fees between department costs and code violation civil penalties.
The order also provided time for the facility to resolve its problems, namely a maximum of 30 days to apply for a water management district permit to build the stormwater pond. But Sunshine Organics & Compost still has a long road of damage control ahead following the permit’s eventual approval, including an additional 30 days to revise site, odor control and operational plans. It would also be required to seek another round of water management approval after the pond is completed and address all remaining violations, according to the consent order.
Though Christina Kelcourse said the Alachua County facility would be “very, very similar” to its Jacksonville predecessor, Gus Olmos — the director of Alachua County’s Solid Waste Resource Recovery Department — didn’t express concern for FDEP scrutiny seeping into the county.
“Those are site specific issues,” he said. “We already have stormwater facilities, so none of those things are applicable to what they were going to do here.”
Olmos said “it’s just too early” to pin down a suitable location to build the proposed facility.
Following the money
A Duval County legal complaint filed in March of 2023 revealed unpaid debt from Kelco Recycling, Michael Kelcourse’s other company.
The recycling operation signed an equipment financing agreement with Financial Pacific Leasing three years prior, but its regular payments ran dry by September 2022.
In April, the case’s final judgment found Kelco Recycling liable for over $80,000 in accumulated damages and court fees, according to public Duval County court records. The Duval County judge in charge of the case also permitted the immediate return of borrowed equipment — a tub grinder — to Financial Pacific Leasing.
Beyond Kelco Recycling, Michael Kelcourse also found himself in hot water with American Express. An Aug. 7 final judgment found him liable for over $20,000 in personal debt that had been due with interest since May of 2023, according to public Duval County court records.
Despite Michael Kelcourse’s recent financial battles, Olmos said Alachua County has not harbored concerns for Sunshine Organics & Compost’s capability to swallow the cost of a new facility.
“We didn’t spend any time looking into those things,” he said.
However, the company expressed having a “strong financial partner confirmed” in its original Ecoloop proposal, though the partner was left unspecified.
The Jacksonville operation received a $4.9 million USDA grant last year, but Christina Kelcourse said no new business grants have been factored into shouldering the cost of an Alachua County facility. She instead confirmed the existence of several silent partners in a “great relationship” with the company and declined to share their identities.
“For a student newspaper, I would say absolutely not,” she said. “We’re not going to get into that.”
Quarrels with police
In the chill of January 2015, a Kelco Recycling employee watched Michael Kelcourse chain a forklift to a trailer. The company had an agreement with a Jacksonville Target location to collect and recycle cardboard, and the two were prepared to haul three bales of it.
That is, until the police arrived.
The employee, hired only one month prior, assured law enforcement the pair had proper documentation for the task, which Michael Kelcourse said he had forgotten. However, a Target employee confirmed something different: The store routinely handled its own recycling, and Michael Kelcourse’s misplaced paperwork was nonexistent, according to the arrest report.
The pair were promptly arrested by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office Jan. 26, 2015, on suspicion of grand theft while the cardboard — approximately $750 worth — was returned to the Target employee, who declined The Alligator’s request for comment.
The Kelco Recycling employee could not be reached in time for publication.
Michael Kelcourse was charged with felony grand theft upon arrest and released without bond, which was later reduced to misdemeanor petit theft.
Then, it happened again in November 2015.
A Jacksonville Save-A-Lot employee watched an unfamiliar box truck loaded with a bale of cardboard depart from the store, and without hesitation, she took chase. Aware of her pursuit, the truck’s driver accelerated to a “high rate of speed attempting to elude her” and finally escaped by running a red light, according to the arrest report.
The Save-A-Lot employee did not respond in time for publication.
Not far behind, the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office located the truck outside of a gas station and arrested Michael Kelcourse and a different Kelco Recycling employee Nov. 18, 2015.
The employee told police he was unaware the pair had been involved in illegal activity and believed Michael Kelcourse was “running a legitimate business.” After being told he had the right to remain silent, Michael Kelcourse confirmed the employee didn’t know he was committing a crime and that the company did not have a contract to recycle the stolen cardboard, which he estimated to be $20 in value, according to the arrest report.
Accurately valued at approximately $800, the bale was returned to Save-A-Lot.
The Kelco Recycling employee did not respond in time for publication.
Michael Kelcourse collected a second charge of felony grand theft upon arrest with a posted bond over $5,000. However, the charge was also later reduced to misdemeanor petit theft.
Michael Kelcourse declined to comment on both arrests and Kelco Recycling debt on account of “all the amazing things we do for the environment and communities we work in,” he wrote in an email.
Where Sunshine stands now
Framed by Gainesville’s established goal of Zero Waste by 2040, the joint city and county Zero Waste Strategic Plan adopted in 2021 includes the development of the county Ecoloop. The loop’s stretch of over 30 acres involves a collection of recycling and repurpose programs located beside Leveda Brown Environmental Park and Transfer Station, said Olmos, who oversees the county’s Solid Waste Resource Recovery Department.
However, Ecoloop compost garnered concern from the nearby Gainesville Regional Airport about circling birds and possible plane strikes, and Aug. 29 brought final disapproval from the Federal Aviation Administration. Though Christina Kelcourse advocated the Jacksonville facility has never attracted birds, she said “we do understand the sensitivity of being in an airplane and not wanting to hit wildlife.”
The county has since tabled its Ecoloop negotiations to aid the company’s search for a private facility location, an operation Olmos said will not be funded by the county.
“We still want to work with them,” he said. “We still think they’re an asset to the community.”
Prior to the airport controversy, Sunshine Organics & Compost was strongly favored by the Citizen Climate, Environmental Protection and Economic Development Advisory Committees as a fit for the county’s climate-action policies, Olmos said.
Although the company’s multiple disputes with the FDEP and Michael Kelcourse’s history with debt and arrests could loom over the project’s intended effects, Olmos said that it did not impact county decision making.
“The decision to cease negotiation is 100% based on the conflict with the airport and the FAA and has nothing to do with all these other allegations,” Olmos said.
The operation’s location and timeline are yet to be determined.
Contact Rylan DiGiacomo-Rapp at rdigiacomo-rapp@alligator.org. Follow her on X @rylan_digirapp.
Rylan DiGiacomo-Rapp is a third year journalism and environmental science major and the Fall 2024 Enterprise Environmental Reporter. Outside of the newsroom, you can usually find her haunting local music venues.
