Hagerstown residents could see trash fees go up; trash must fit in new cans as of July 1

Hagerstown residents recently received new trash cans to use and soon could be facing a higher quarterly trash fee.

The trash cans were actually purchased with about $1 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds the city received, City Engineer Jim Bender said.

But the city's cost for trash, recycling and yard waste collection is going up significantly, and the city's proposed budget, at this point, calls for raising the quarterly trash fee.

The fee, now $55 every three months, is proposed to increase to $73, Bender said. That's a $18, or 33%, jump. Annually, those costs increase from $220 to $292.

The trash fee shows up on city water and wastewater bills.

The city recently agreed to a new contract for residential trash, recycling and yard waste with current provider Waste Management.

That deal calls for the cost of those services to increase $1.1 million, or 43%, from $2,627,428 for the current year to $3,752,000 for the first year of the new contract, according to Bender.

Councilman Kristin Aleshire, during an Aug. 8 work session about bids for the new trash contract, said that factoring in inflationary costs, including gas prices, since the last contract was approved in 2017, he didn't find it to be a "big increase."

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Bender said Waste Management was the only company to bid on the city's request for refuse services.

Two other companies attended the prebid meeting, but did not submit bids. One of those companies does a fair amount of rural trash collection, Bender said in an email. The third company had concerns about doing residential trash collection in a dense, urban environment using automated collection practices.

According to a YouTube video of the August meeting, Bender said the comparable cost for trash collection, less frequent recycling collection and no yard waste collection from two other providers in Washington County at that time, would have cost $430 or $466 a year.

"Like most businesses are experiencing, the cost of providing service has increased exponentially, especially over the past year," Waste Management spokesperson Erika Deyarmin Young responded via email.

Bender said the city's new contract with Waste Management is for three years, with an option to renew it for an additional three years. Like the current contract, it has increases built in based on the Consumer Price Index. But Waste Management told city officials those CPI increases were not enough to keep up with increased costs the last several years, he said.

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Recycling a big factor in cost increase

Recyclables was the primary reason for the increase in the city's refuse collection contract, Councilman Aleshire said during an April 9 work session. The value of recyclables has decreased for the hauler.

"If you want to keep doing recycling, it's going to cost you," explained Aleshire, according to a YouTube video of the meeting.

The cost of recycling collection alone is going up 44%, Bender said in a phone interview.

The city could reduce the cost by eliminating recycling collection or cut in half how often recycling is collected, Chief Financial Officer Michelle Hepburn said during the work session.

But then either the recyclables go in the trash stream or residents have to find a place to store them while they wait a longer period for the next collection, Hepburn said.

Hepburn said costs also are going up because, as with other employers and jobs, Waste Management is operating in more of a "payroll market" where salaries and benefits are significantly higher than in the past.

Recyclable items in the city include plastic containers with symbols 1 through 7, aluminum food and beverage containers, ferrous cans, junk mail, newsprint, printer paper, fiber-board such as cereal and shoe boxes, corrugated cardboard, aerosol cans and — added again last year — glass bottles and jars.

Bender said he anticipates the city will continue to hold its annual — and popular — electronics recycling event.

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What's with the new green trash cans?

When city officials were preparing to get bids on a new refuse collection contract, providers told them that nationwide there is a movement toward automated collection, Bender said.

That is a truck with an arm that reaches out and grabs the trash can and dumps it in over the side of the truck without the driver needing to get out.

Waste Management's investment in those new trucks is another reason for the cost increase, Bender said in August.

"Automated collection is safer and more efficient for our front line team members," Deyarmin Young said via email. "In addition, this type of service helps keep costs low because our automated collection trucks only require a one-person team to service the customer."

One reason Waste Management is moving toward automated collection is because it has had a difficult time finding employees, including drivers, Deyarmin Young said in a phone interview.

There will be no layoffs, she said when asked about the impact of the new automated practices.

When the city began distributing the new trash cans on March 18, phones starting ringing about nonstop for three weeks, Bender said. Most of those calls were about the cans being too big.

The vast majority of residents received the 95-gallon tote, Bender said. The thinking was that because residents will only be able to have trash collected that is in the appropriate tote, they should be given the larger can.

Residents can request a smaller 65- or 35-gallon trash tote. Bender suggests they first try the 95-gallon tote to see if that one works better for their needs leading up to July 1, when Waste Management will switch to only collecting trash in the official totes. That means no loose bags or other trash cans.

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"Officially, that's the plan," Bender said.

Even with the new trash trucks coming, not all trash will be able to be collected through the automated process because those trucks won't be able to get close enough to the curb due to so much curbside parking in the city.

Waste Management will continue to use rear-load trucks in those situations, Deyarmin Young said.

Bender said residents who want to use their old trash cans to set out yard waste can contact the city and get a bumper sticker mailed to them to put on those cans, identifying them for yard waste pickup. The old plastic trash cans can't be collected for recycling because the plastic shredders can't handle shredding those receptacles, he said.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Hagerstown proposes higher trash fee with new Waste Management deal