Let’s talk trash. The rates we pay for city utilities such as water, solid-waste (garbage) disposal, wastewater (sewage) and stormwater runoff will be increasing dramatically in the years to come.
Costs for landfills and Hyperion sewage treatment have far outpaced the cost-of-living index. The city’s internal operating expenses have spiraled upward, too, especially in the areas of labor, fuel and vehicle maintenance, adding a double whammy. A number of ideas have been presented over the last few years to reduce solid-waste expenses.
Based on published rates, Santa Monica single-family homes pay $372 per year for curbside refuse and recycling service. This is 50 percent more than similar homes in Beverly Hills and Culver City, and a whopping 200 percent more than those in Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach and West Hollywood. Citywide, this equates to millions of dollars a year in excess fees. Now, city staff members recommend increasing our ballooning rate to $444 per year. It seems that something’s out of line.
Here, average commercial rates for a 3-cubic-yard bin are $55 per month while Beverly Hills charges $105.85, Culver City charges $101.75 and Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach and West Hollywood range from $61.84 to $93.55. These figures seem to suggest to me that homeowners might be “subsidizing” commercial trash collection.
The present city transfer yard where trash is sorted, separated and prepared for recycling or transport to a landfill is in terrible shape. There’s no roof. Dust becomes airborne and isn’t even adequately monitored. Runoff loaded with toxins and poisons pours into the sewer drain and into the bay. These conditions are of concern to both the Los Angeles County Department of Health and the Air Quality Management District. If more widely known, they would probably end those “sustainable city” awards the city prizes so highly.
In 2002, one staff recommendation called for expansion and upgrading the current, antiquated city yard. The cost for this new “Santa Monica Active Recycling Recovery Transfer Station” (SMARRTS) was estimated at $7.5 million then and would probably be in the range of $12 million today.
The city has also considered retaining an outside supplier or private company to perform some waste-transfer functions. In January 2004, City Council asked Craig Perkins, director of solid-waste management, to report back on the feasibility of allowing a privately owned transfer operation such as Southern California Disposal (SCD) to provide services. City Council is still waiting for Perkins’ report.
Some city staff are nervous about pri-vatizing city services, but solid-waste management is already using private vendors. Crown Disposal annually bills about a half million dollars to the city for recycling services and has never been asked to submit a bid in an open bidding process. All “blue container” recyclables are processed by another private contractor, Allan Company, whose contract with the city expired May 31, 2004.
State law says that construction and demolition material, often brought in by self-haulers, can be taken to any of dozens of permitted facilities that meet state standards such as “recycling at least 60 percent of material.” So, why does Santa Monica have a short list of three or four favored vendors that they say contractors and haulers should use?
This amounts to city endorsement of outside vendors and raises the spectre of favoritism, conflicts of interest, possible payoffs and even restraint of trade — something the city and its employees should scrupulously avoid.
Santa Monica disposes of 103 tons of hazardous material such as paint, solvents and corrosives, annually. The budget for “toxic disposal” is $335,000 — or a whopping $3,140.77 per ton. Solid-waste experts I interviewed when researching this column told me the national average for toxic disposal is $1,100 per ton. Why is Santa Monica’s cost almost three times higher?
Solid-waste expenses could be controlled and possibly reduced by soliciting a Request For Proposal (RFP), having it honestly evaluated by other-than-vested interests (such as the city’s own solid-waste management staff) and bidding some services out.
According to a June 4, 2003, city study, SCD, the private company located next to the city yards, has a permitted transfer station that could process city waste and recyclables and “save the city $474,000 annually” — and free up millions of dollars more in city resources. So, why are we occasionally hauling unprocessed waste all the way to Culver City instead of next door? How fiscally responsible or “green” is that?
City Council needs to start talking trash and get to the bottom of this garbage. (Bill Bauer is a longtime Santa Monica resident and a freelance writer.)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 13, 2005. Read the original PDF.