Residents urge BOS to ‘trash’ new plan for rural garbage

By Audrey Posten | Times-Register

The Clayton County Board of Supervisors (BOS) is reevaluating a plan that would eliminate rural garbage collection sites, after residents firmly objected to the change during discussion at the Dec. 18 BOS meeting.

At a meeting the week prior, the supervisors had approved moving forward with a bid from Waste Management for $7,192.63 per month on a five-year contract—a plan that would require all estimated 5,200 rural dwellings to dispose of their garbage in Elkader. The supervisors said the new contract would be more affordable than one from Kluesner Sanitation or long-time hauler Hawkeye Sanitation, who board chair Ray Peterson said was proposing a $200,000 increase from the current annual cost of $160,000.

“The contract hadn’t been updated for awhile and there were some issues going on,” Peterson said. He accused Hawkeye of a lack of transparency on tonnage and referenced the company’s need to rebuild recycling trailers when those in use did not meet DOT guidelines, leaving rural residents without recycling services since this summer. 

“And it’s quite an increase,” Peterson added. “That’s got us where we’re at.”

Collection from one Elkader site by Waste Management would save the county roughly $60,000, he noted.

Julian and Lucas Merritt, who run Hawkeye Sanitation, defended their company. Julian said a lack of incremental increases over the previous contract “meant we were not making money off providing a service to you.” 

“I apologize to you guys because, if we had put these incremental increases in over the years, which is how we do things now, this would not be happening. We hadn’t had an increase in many years,” he explained. “When we added our increase in, it was to get to a point where we were making a profit so we can continue to buy new trucks, new trailers as things break down. If we were ever to serve the county again, it would never be an issue because we will incrementally increase those and look at the cost per year.”

Julian Merritt acknowledged Hawkeye Sanitation was responsible for a document that went out to rural residents that showed the proposed monthly cost to Clayton County taxpayers for current services under a three-, five- or seven-year contract. 

Under a five-year contract, Hawkeye said taxpayers currently paying $2.62 per month would see that increase to $3.21 per month the first year, and eventually reach $5.55 per month in year five, while keeping rural sites intact.

The sheet also listed the mileage to Elkader from rural garbage pickup sites near Millville, McGregor, Strawberry Point, Garber, Gunder and Garnavillo, and encouraged people to call the supervisors with questions.

“The letters that we put out, I know the county is not happy about that, but we have been getting phone calls like this is a service we are cutting out. We can’t afford to have that bad PR on us. In my opinion, you would not know if we had not sent them,” Merritt told the audience.

Rural residents also called the supervisors’ transparency into question, with one saying the “perception is this is a behind-closed-doors decision.” Others wondered how taxpayers were notified of proposed changes. Peterson responded that agendas, as well as previous meeting minutes, are posted online.

“You think that, when we change something, we’re not going to tell the public?” asked supervisor Doug Reimer. “We’ve been working on this with them for a minimum of four months. We have been trying a lot. There was no sense in us trying to do anything because we haven’t put everything together yet.”

“I never thought there’d be this much backlash,” Reimer added.

The backlash is for multiple reasons, according to those who attended the meeting. Chief among them is the inconvenience and added cost of traveling to Elkader, especially for those living in the southern part of Clayton County. The document from Hawkeye Sanitation said the trek from Millville is 27 miles.

“It takes an hour to get to and from [Elkader], and it’s not going to be me. It’s going to be my 70-year-old mom,” said one resident. “That’s very upsetting and why a lot of us are here today.”

“All you’re doing is putting the burden on the residents. You’re passing the burden onto already strapped individuals, a lot of them on fixed incomes,” another resident said. “You’re going to take this from $2 per week driving three bags of garbage to our current dump station to $7 a week.”

He said current wait times might be 15 minutes for half a dozen vehicles. “Now, I’m going to have to come to Elkader, where everybody in Clayton County is going to be dropping their garbage, and there’s going to be 100 pickups backed up. It’s going to take two hours just to drop off.”

Residents said they appreciate having weekly rural pickup, where the Hawkeye driver often helps them unload their garbage. They feared eliminating sites would lead to garbage in roadside ditches.

“We believe it will result in...an increase in illegal dumping, illegal burning of waste and an environmental and health hazard to our rural residents,” Anne and Mark Brockway stated in a letter read aloud at the meeting. “We need to maintain access to clean, safe garbage collection...We are counting on our elected officials to provide leadership as well as financial and environmental stewardship. Natural beauty is one of the jewels of Clayton County.”

In addition to that environmental impact, “everyone in this room is going to be in their car, wasting fuel and time,” another resident said.

Audience members wondered if going to bi-weekly, rather than weekly, collection at satellite sites could cut costs. One person suggested placing dumpsters at the sites and installing cameras to catch those who are wrongfully using the service.

Most, though, said they would be willing to pay more to maintain the same service.

“Isn’t the question you should be asking is if the residents of Clayton County are willing to pick up this incremental cost? If the taxpayers are saying, ‘We understand we’re going to pay a few bucks more a month, are you guys OK with that?’ Isn’t that your job to let us determine whether we want to do that or not?” one man said to murmurs of agreement.

“We’re not talking about a lot of money,” another person added. “Our taxes are always going to raise. You can’t go in there every year with the same millage rate thinking you’re going to run the county on the same. Eventually, you’re going to have to raise a little taxing base.”

One audience member wondered why there was perceived resistance to this consensus.

“Why are you so resistant to raise our taxes when we’re saying raise them, keep the same service and we’ll be happy,” he said. 

“You’ll never hear that again,” one woman added to a round of applause.

Peterson said service would likely remain with Hawkeye through the current fiscal year, to the end of June. The supervisors are willing to look at ideas.

“We’ll talk it over and get on the same page. We told Waste Management to hold up,” Peterson said.

Reimer noted that, although Waste Management was approved for the garbage services, a contract has not been signed.

“We will look into it,” he said. “We are listening. I appreciate every person who came in here today.”