Commissioner Tom Del Conte
Tom Del Conte founded Del Conte’s Landscaping in 1972, taking on small projects to put himself through college. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science, Business Administration from Cal State Hayward 1978, and he has years of experience as a Compost Facilities Operator, a green waste recycler and a Certified Landscape Professional.
In 1993, Tom founded Vision Recycling, a separate organic recycling-company and compost producer in the Monterey and San Francisco Bay areas that provides mobile grinding services, turn-key operations, hauling capabilities, and solutions for recycling challenges. Here, his team takes organic material (Green Waste, Yard Trimmings & Food Scraps) and transforms the finished product into compost, wood chips, mulch, and soil amendments while valuing a localized approach to green waste recycling. This minimizes trucks on the road and keeps the material in the soils from which they came. Vision Recycling processes close to 200,000 tons of feedstock annually.
Tom has participated in public speaking engagements for recycled organics, irrigation water conservation and Green Business concepts. He has consulted with the Alameda County Stop Waste agency for Green Business program development and is fanatical about organizational and procedural details and training programs. As the leader of the organization, this has stability implications as evidenced by over four decades of business success.
Commissioner Jack Hoeck
Jack is Vice President of Production for Rexius Forest By-Products Inc. of Eugene, Oregon. He has been with the company for 35 years and was instrumental in developing the company’s yard debris recycling centers.
Jack has worked with the City of Eugene to create the “Love Food Not Waste” program that provides opportunities to compost food waste from commercial businesses in the City of Eugene. He has over 25 years of experience in the production of compost from a wide variety feedstocks. Jack has received classroom training from The US Composting Council and is invited to speak at many conferences about the composting process and the compost industry.
He has served as a Board member for US Composting Council and held positions as Vice president and President.
Commissioner Matt Cotton
Matthew Cotton has worked in organics and solid waste management since 1986. He has served as a consultant, educator, researcher, and advocate for new and expanded organics recycling and composting programs in California and beyond. Mr. Cotton has completed hundreds of significant organics projects, including permitting and assisting in the development of some of the major composting facilities in California. Mr. Cotton served on the Board of Directors of the US Composting Council for almost two decades, including three terms as president, and also serves on the Board of Californians Against Waste. He has published research on compost odors, compost use, climate impacts, compostable plastics, and compost facility infrastructure. He is the main author of SWANA's Managing Composting Programs course, SWANA's course on Organics Collection; and the organics chapter of the SWANA/CRRA Zero Waste Course. He co-developed and teaches the Foundations of Composting Course and is a lead instructor for the USCC's Compost Operator Training Course. In addition to teaching extensively in the US, he has taught composting and lectured in China, Brazil, Canada, and Australia.
In over 30 years of work Mr. Cotton has become a respected national resource for all aspects of organics recycling. From providing permitting assistance to new and expanded composting, anaerobic digestion, and chipping & grinding facilities, to providing hands on odor control mitigations at organics processing, digestion, and composting facilities, to conducting important statewide studies of the California organics industry and advising on organics policy.
Commissioner Scott Gamble
Scott Gamble has over twenty-five years of technical and facility operations/management experience in the waste management industry. While he has worked on various solid waste landfill and transfer projects, the majority of his career has been spent in the organic waste management industry where he has completed feasibility and design projects, commissioned new facilities and helped with troubleshooting at existing sites. In addition to his technical and engineering knowledge, Scott has extensive operating experience at composting and other solid waste facilities. This includes almost ten years working at or managing landfill and composting facilities in the Edmonton and Calgary areas. In his current position, Scott supports the development of new sites and optimization of existing facilities across the US and Canada.
Scott has been actively involved in operator training and certification for many years. He is a former Director and past-Chairman of the Compost Council of Canada (CCC), and was the CCC’s lead trainer for several years. During this time he was also heavily involved with the development and management of the CCC’s Compost Operator Certification Program, and was part of the Solid Waste Operator Certification Advisory Committee for Alberta Environment. He has written several white papers and guidance documents, including a study guide for compost facility operators, and developed the content for the CCC’s operator training program.
Commissioner Jean Bonhotal
Jean has worked at the Cornell Waste Management Institute in solid waste education for over 20 years, Reducing, repurposing, recycling and composting solid and organic residuals to mine and redirect resources from our waste stream is a systematic way to manage our waste stream.
She works on composting feedstock from food to manure to animal carcasses. Currently her time includes work on food scrap, manure and carcass & butcher waste composting education and research. Characterizing waste streams is important to be able to separate and determine value-added purposes for different residuals. Compost quality and consistency in the market place is also a high priority, as well as encouraging use to build healthy soils and redistribute nutrients.
Commissioner Rod Tyler
Rod Tyler is a graduate of The Ohio State University, a Certified Professional Agronomist, and has been working with compost and environmental projects for nearly 30 years. Rod’s early career in composting began operating small compost sites and marketing the finished products. He was instrumental in early developments in the colored mulch business common today. As former owner and founder of Filtrexx International, Rod invented and patented the Compost Filter Sock technology. Rod received 8 patents during the Filtrexx development including applications for living walls, living shorelines, sediment control, compost blankets and over 20 total low impact development applications. These applications have resulted in millions of cubic yards of compost being used each year in applications that never existed before. His multiple publications include three books about compost, several chapters in other books, hundreds of industry articles, and research papers. Rod has presented at hundreds of industry related meetings as well as keynote presentations for dozens of conferences. Rod has been involved with the US Composting Council since the first meeting serving on the marketing committee, Vice President, President and Board of directors for many years. Rod is the Midwest Regional Operations Manager for WeCare Denali and covers Chicago, Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor and Ohio.
Commissioner Noel Lyons
Noel Lyons co-founded McGill Environmental Systems in 1991 and has served as President since 2000. McGill owns and/or operates composting facilities in New Jersey, North Carolina, Virginia, Florida and Ireland. The company employs 220 people and annually composts over 500,000 tons of biodegradable materials including yard waste, biosolids and food waste and sells over 1M cubic yards of compost, mulch and soils.
Noel received the USCC’s Hi Kellogg Award in 2022 and in 2011, McGill was awarded the U.S. Composting Council’s Compost Facility of the Year, Large-Scale.
Noel has also developed Technology License agreements. Further, he has been involved in the design of more than a dozen facilities including a number of proposed co-located anaerobic digestion (AD) and composting facilities and was granted a patent for a component of the McGill composting process.
He holds a degree in Agriculture Science from the Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland and a certificate of Technical Competence in Composting from the University of Maine Cooperative Extension. On behalf of McGill and the industry, Noel has presented at and moderated at numerous conferences throughout the U.S. He has contributed to USCC Compost Operations training courses.
Frank Franciosi, USCC Executive Director
Frank Franciosi has had a long-standing involvement with the US Composting Council as a past board member and president. His extensive industry knowledge and experience provides the US Composting Council and its membership with strong vision and leadership to meet the needs of the organization.
Frank’s resumé includes more than 20 years of experience in marketing, operations management, residuals management, training, executive planning, and administration. He holds a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Plant & Soil Sciences from the West Virginia University Davis College of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Design.
Teri Sorg McManamon, Director of Professional Development
Teri Sorg-McManamon is a marketing communication and non-profit professional and has been in the organics and composting industry for 30+ years. Previous roles at BioCycle magazine and Rodale Institute along with varied board and committee positions including the US Composting Council, has given Teri diverse expertise in all aspects of successful project management, public relations, and community/member outreach.
Aaron Fuehrer, Database Assistant
Aaron Fuehrer comes to the USCC with many years of managing similar databases for other associations. As database assistant for professional development, Aaron will be working on processing PDHs, adding Compost U courses, tracking certification applications, and related duties.