Waste Management gives back

OCEANSIDE — Last weekend, Waste Management was one of a number of major sponsors of Quincy Jones’ Rockin’ the Corps event, which attracted over 55,000 Marines and their families. While this looked in some ways like a traditional “good neighbor” corporate sponsorship, the reality actually goes much deeper.

Waste Management is a traditional good neighbor. Both the base itself and the City of Oceanside are customers of Waste Management, so everyone at the company’s North County office spends a lot of time working with the military and their families. There are lots of logistics to work out, with military families cycling in and out of the area. For these reasons alone, when base personnel come calling asking WM for help, the North County Office is always receptive. Base personnel didn’t hesitate to steer Quincy Jones’ company to WM when they needed to put together the sponsorship for the mega-event, and North County District Manager John Lusignan and Market Area Manager Jason Rose quickly approved it.

But the relationship goes much deeper. Lusignan spent 24 years in the Marine Corps both as an enlisted man and an officer and did two tours of duty in Vietnam. He joined Waste Management 15 years ago as a district manager. “I see these young guys struggling to make ends meet while juggling the demands of the Corps and the pressures of having young families, and doing it all with such strength of character.” Lusignan and Rose are so impressed with the Marine esprit, in fact, that a remarkable number of their team members have a military background. Including Lusignan, there are 11 team members who’ve been in the military, and between them, they have a staggering 149 years of military service. Not surprisingly, most of these were in the Marine Corps.

Twenty-five local and area WM employees, including Lori Somers, recycling manager and coordinator, as well as Rose and Lusignan, worked the Waste Management booth at last weekend’s Rockin’ the Corps concert. Also working the booth were WM CEO David Steiner and VP Business Ethics & Chief Diversity Officer Carlton Yearwood. “We gave out Frisbees and beach balloons, and our NASCAR driver Bill Lester was there with his truck, signing autographs. It was a great feeling to be doing something that was so purely giving back to these young men and women who are doing so much for us,” says Rose. “It was particularly rewarding to see the young families there, because I know that those husbands, wives and kids of Pendleton Marines are constantly living with that nagging fear that their loved ones too could be sent across the world tomorrow.”

The giving back doesn’t end with last week’s concert. Rose and Lusignan continue to be on the alert for returning Marines who would make a good addition to the local team. Waste Management North County is a table sponsor at the Quarterly Military Recognition Breakfasts, where selected Marine and Navy enlisted personnel are recognized as the “best of the best,” and in May WM will again be a co-sponsor of Military Appreciation Day. As Lusignan puts it, “I consider myself lucky to be in a place where I can do good by my business at the same time as I am doing good by the Corps.”