Posted: Nov. 15, 2018 8:55 pm

QUINCY -- Nearly identical to town hall meetings held in 2013, many residents told Mayor Kyle Moore on Thursday night that they don't want the city to privatize trash collection.

Many in the standing-room-only crowd at the Quincy Public Library suggested the city raise the sticker price by 25 cents to $1 or $10 per sheet, a proposed option by Moore.

They also wanted the city to maintain a recycling program and find a way to have curbside yard waste pickup.

Moore thinks that raising the sticker price to $1 per month could stabilize the trash system for at least five years.

Some attending, including former Mayor Chuck Scholz, said the city's sticker system encourages recycling and only charges people for what they use.

The city spends about $1.6 million a year on trash collection and sells about $1 million in trash stickers at 75 cents per sticker. Moore said the city financial picture makes it difficult to maintain the program.

Three companies proposed privatizing the program, with one unnamed company offering to buy the city's trash trucks and collect trash from 95-gallon totes at a cost of $10.25 per month. The company would be able to raise rates by 2.5 percent each year.

Moore presented options that included a less costly rate for senior citizens with smaller totes.

He said if the city privatized trash collection, the city could enhance services, such as buying equipment to resurface alleys.

The city received no bidders to operate the city's yard waste collection program. The city now has a contract with Evans Recycling to operate a brush site on Radio Road and handle yard waste pickup for $570,000. However, Moore said that Evans Recycling did provide a bid to maintain the city's brush site starting at $410,000 a year.

"Some people may ask if the city starts picking up yard waste," he said. "For our city crews to do that, it would cost about an additional $700,000. We can do that, but we would have to find that $700,000 for that."

Suggestions were made for instituting a sticker for yard waste, but as one resident noted, many residents might not have the ability to haul yard waste to the site.

The city received one bidder to take over the city's recycling program, but it would be more expensive than the city's $500,000 annual cost for collections.

"To give you an idea of if we were going to break even on recycling, we'd have to charge everybody about $4," Moore said.

The city's contracts for the landfill, recyclables and yard waste expire April 30, meaning the city will need to make a decision in the next few months.

No date has been set on when the City Council could move forward with any proposals.

In 2013, Moore proposed to privatize trash and recycling services, charging each of about 15,000 households the same monthly fee.

That plan met with stiff public opposition and gained no attention from the council.

Aldermen approved a plan in 2014 to raise trash sticker fees from 50 cents to 75 cents. Residents also got the option of paying a monthly $12.99 fee for collection of a 95-gallon tote in lieu of stickers.

A $1,000-per-year licensing fee also was established for private trash haulers.