Note 11 - Commitments and Contingencies

12 Months Ended

Aug. 29, 2015

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Text Block]

11. Commitments and Contingencies

Lease Commitments

The Company leases certain buildings and equipment from independent parties. Total rent expense on all leases was $9.8 million, $9.9 million and $8.7 million for the fiscal years ended 2015, 2014 and 2013, respectively. Annual minimum lease commitments for the five years subsequent to August 29, 2015 and thereafter are as follows (in thousands):

2016	$	8,317
2017		6,264
2018		4,671
2019		3,332
2020		3,071
Thereafter		2,591
	$	28,246

Environmental and Legal Contingencies

The Company and its operations are subject to various federal, state and local laws and regulations governing, among other things, air emissions, wastewater discharges, and the generation, handling, storage, transportation, treatment and disposal of hazardous waste and other substances. In particular, industrial laundries use and must dispose of detergent waste water and other residues, and, in the past used perchloroethylene and other dry cleaning solvents. The Company is attentive to the environmental concerns surrounding the disposal of these materials and has, through the years, taken measures to avoid their improper disposal. In the past, the Company has settled, or contributed to the settlement of, actions or claims brought against the Company relating to the disposal of hazardous materials and there can be no assurance that the Company will not have to expend material amounts to remediate the consequences of any such disposal in the future.

US GAAP requires that a liability for contingencies be recorded when it is probable that a liability has been incurred and the amount of the liability can be reasonably estimated. Significant judgment is required to determine the existence of a liability, as well as the amount to be recorded. The Company regularly consults with attorneys and outside consultants in its consideration of the relevant facts and circumstances before recording a contingent liability. Changes in enacted laws, regulatory orders or decrees, management’s estimates of costs, risk-free interest rates, insurance proceeds, participation by other parties, the timing of payments, the input of the Company’s attorneys and outside consultants or other factual circumstances could have a material impact on the amounts recorded for environmental and other contingent liabilities.

Under environmental laws, an owner or lessee of real estate may be liable for the costs of removal or remediation of certain hazardous or toxic substances located on, or in, or emanating from, such property, as well as related costs of investigation and property damage. Such laws often impose liability without regard to whether the owner or lessee knew of, or was responsible for the presence of such hazardous or toxic substances. There can be no assurances that acquired or leased locations have been operated in compliance with environmental laws and regulations or that future uses or conditions will not result in the imposition of liability upon the Company under such laws or expose the Company to third-party actions such as tort suits. The Company continues to address environmental conditions under terms of consent orders or otherwise negotiated with the applicable environmental authorities with respect to sites located in or related to Woburn, Massachusetts, Somerville, Massachusetts, Springfield, Massachusetts, Uvalde, Texas, Stockton, California, three sites related to former operations in Williamstown, Vermont, as well as sites located in Goldsboro, North Carolina, Wilmington, North Carolina and Landover, Maryland.

The Company has accrued certain costs related to the sites described above as it has been determined that the costs are probable and can be reasonably estimated. The Company has potential exposure related to a parcel of land (the "Central Area") related to the Woburn, Massachusetts site discussed above. Currently, the consent decree for the Woburn site does not define or require any remediation work in the Central Area. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (the "EPA") has provided the Company and other signatories to the consent decree with comments on the design and implementation of groundwater and soil remedies at the Woburn site and investigation of environmental conditions in the Central Area. The Company, and other signatories, have implemented and proposed to do additional work at the Woburn site but many of the EPA’s comments remain to be resolved. The Company has accrued costs to perform certain work responsive to EPA's comments. The Company is also in discussions with EPA concerning its invoices for oversight costs with respect to the Woburn site and the Central Area. The Company has implemented mitigation measures and continues to monitor environmental conditions at the Somerville, Massachusetts site. In fiscal 2015, we also recorded an additional $3.0 million in expense related to our environmental contingency reserves compared to the prior year. This increase was due to a number of factors, including additional costs we expect to incur associated with the construction of a planned municipal transit station in the area of our Somerville site as well as the impact of lower interest rates on the discounting of our environmental liabilities in the prior year.

The Company routinely reviews and evaluates sites that may require remediation and monitoring and determines its estimated costs based on various estimates and assumptions. These estimates are developed using its internal sources or by third party environmental engineers or other service providers. Internally developed estimates are based on:

• Management’s judgment and experience in remediating and monitoring the Company’s sites;

• Information available from regulatory agencies as to costs of remediation and monitoring;

• The number, financial resources and relative degree of responsibility of other potentially responsible parties (“PRPs”) who may be liable for remediation and monitoring of a specific site; and

• The typical allocation of costs among PRPs.

There is usually a range of reasonable estimates of the costs associated with each site. In accordance with US GAAP, the Company’s accruals reflect the amount within the range that it believes is the best estimate or the low end of a range of estimates if no point within the range is a better estimate. Where it believes that both the amount of a particular liability and the timing of the payments are reliably determinable, the Company adjusts the cost in current dollars using a rate of 3% for inflation until the time of expected payment and discounts the cost to present value using current risk-free interest rates. As of August 29, 2015, the risk-free interest rates utilized by the Company ranged from 2.2% to 2.9%.

For environmental liabilities that have been discounted, the Company includes interest accretion, based on the effective interest method, in selling and administrative expenses on the accompanying Consolidated Statements of Income. The changes to the Company’s environmental liabilities for the years ended August 29, 2015 and August 30, 2014 were as follows (in thousands):

Year ended	August 29, 2015			August 30, 2014
Beginning balance	$	19,846		$	19,680
Costs incurred for which reserves have been provided		(2,014	)		(2,913	)
Insurance proceeds		121			687
Interest accretion		603			716
Changes in discount rates		224			1,080
Revisions in estimates		4,527			596
Ending balance	$	23,307		$	19,846

Anticipated payments and insurance proceeds of currently identified environmental remediation liabilities as of August 29, 2015, for the next five fiscal years and thereafter, as measured in current dollars, are reflected below.

(In thousands)	2016			2017			2018			2019			2020			Thereafter			Total
Estimated costs – current dollars	$	7,413		$	1,829		$	1,476		$	1,309		$	1,361		$	12,493		$	25,881
Estimated insurance proceeds		(159	)		(173	)		(159	)		(173	)		(159	)		(1,293	)		(2,116	)
Net anticipated costs	$	7,254		$	1,656		$	1,317		$	1,136		$	1,202		$	11,200		$	23,765
Effect of inflation																				7,255
Effect of discounting																				(7,713	)
Balance as of August 29, 2015																			$	23,307

Estimated insurance proceeds are primarily received from an annuity received as part of a legal settlement with an insurance company. Annual proceeds of approximately $0.3 million are deposited into an escrow account which funds remediation and monitoring costs for three sites related to former operations in Williamstown, Vermont. Annual proceeds received but not expended in the current year accumulate in this account and may be used in future years for costs related to this site through the year 2027. As of August 29, 2015, the balance in this escrow account, which is held in a trust and is not recorded in the Company’s accompanying Consolidated Balance Sheet, was approximately $3.2 million. Also included in estimated insurance proceeds are amounts the Company is entitled to receive pursuant to legal settlements as reimbursements from three insurance companies for estimated costs at the site in Uvalde, Texas.

The Company’s nuclear garment decontamination facilities are licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (“NRC”), or, in certain cases, by the applicable state agency, and are subject to regulation by federal, state and local authorities. There can be no assurance that such regulation will not lead to material disruptions in the Company’s garment decontamination business.

From time to time, the Company is also subject to legal proceedings and claims arising from the conduct of its business operations, including personal injury claims, customer contract matters, employment claims and environmental matters as described above.

While it is impossible to ascertain the ultimate legal and financial liability with respect to contingent liabilities, including lawsuits and environmental contingencies, the Company believes that the aggregate amount of such liabilities, if any, in excess of amounts covered by insurance have been properly accrued in accordance with US GAAP. It is possible, however, that the future financial position or results of operations for any particular period could be materially affected by changes in the Company’s assumptions or strategies related to these contingencies or changes out of the Company’s control.

As previously disclosed, in February 2015 the Company and its insurers entered into a Settlement and Release Agreement (the “Settlement Agreement”) with respect to pending and potential future suits against the Company relating to New England Compounding Center’s (“NECC”) highly-publicized compounding and sale of tainted methylprednisolone acetate, which reportedly resulted in a widespread outbreak of fungal meningitis and other infections.  It had been reported that over 60 people died and another approximately 700 people were allegedly seriously injured as a result of this outbreak.  These suits against the Company related to the limited, once-a-month cleaning services the Company provided to portions of NECC’s cleanroom facilities. 

In accordance with the Settlement Agreement and NECC’s Chapter 11 Plan (the “Plan”), and pursuant to orders issued by the bankruptcy court adjudicating NECC’s bankruptcy, the settlement is now final and not subject to any appeals. Under the settlement, the Company’s insurers paid the full settlement amount of $30.5 million and the Company received the benefit of the releases and injunction set forth in the Plan, which bar all persons from asserting any claims against the Company relating to the NECC matter.

Other Contingent Liabilities

As security for certain agreements with the NRC and various state agencies related to the nuclear operations (see above) and certain insurance programs, the Company had standby irrevocable bank commercial letters of credit of $52.9 million and $49.6 million outstanding as of August 29, 2015 and August 30, 2014, respectively.