St. Paul considers city-run trash collection system

St. Paul is considering a major change to the way trash is collected in the city, possibly ending the longstanding practice of letting homeowners and businesses choose their own trash service.

The city this week approved $330,000 in funding for consulting work and additional staff aimed at organizing garbage collection in the city for the first time in more than 30 years. Minneapolis put in a public trash collection system decades ago.

In St. Paul now, 19 different haulers are licensed to collect trash in the city in a so-called "open" system. They contract individually with residents and business, who are free to change providers to find lower cost or better service. But critics say the fleets of garbage trucks that drive through St. Paul — often on overlapping routes — aren't fuel efficient, are an obstacle to better service and put unnecessary wear and tear on roads and alleys.

St. Paul City Council President Russ Stark is leading the effort.

"People care about two things: they care about having a local or small hauler, a company that they believe is on the up and up, and the other thing they care about is price and service," Stark said. "And what we know today is that the average homeowner in St. Paul is paying quite a bit more for trash service than in our surrounding communities where they have organized collection."

Stark said the city hasn't committed to a specific organization plan or determined to what degree the city would be involved. It could pick a single hauler or take bids from a coalition of haulers. It could also divide up the city among multiple haulers. But City Hall is planning to formally start the legal process as soon as April.

The move comes just weeks after the city put out a request for new recycling providers, expected to start operations in about a year. The city is also expecting to take bids on collecting compostable waste early next year.

City involvement in trash collection has been controversial before. St. Paul got out of the business of providing public trash collection in 1980, after years of trying to compete with private haulers, according to a recent study by the Macalester-Groveland Community Council. Various attempts to regulate trash collection have been proposed by city officials in the intervening years, including a resolution to organize collection in 1987.

But opposition by residents and haulers has killed the effort in the past — and haulers continued to express apprehension in recent community meetings about the impact of organized collection on their business. They've said they fear the change could force out small and local companies, limit their market share or force them into less-profitable or difficult-to-service areas of the city. The Mac-Groveland report this year said haulers had apprehensions about change in general.

"Our intention is to pursue organized trash collection in St. Paul at this point," Stark said. "There's obviously going to be some work to get there, and people will have an opportunity to weigh in with what they care about, but based on what we've heard, we feel like we already know for the most part what the issues are, and we've heard from the public that this is something they want."

The trash plan has been a recent addition to the city's 2016 budget, and won't start taking shape for months. That will be after a new council is sworn in in January, including two new members. It isn't clear yet what support a change to garbage collection will have, although Stark is confident the council will move on it.

Tonya Tennessen, spokesperson for Chris Coleman, said the mayor isn't ready to commit to the idea yet.

"I think what the mayor is really interested in is hearing from people, and a broad cross section of people about how they'd like to see this implemented. I think he's in general open to the concept, but he'd like to hear more."

Trash collection around the Twin Cities

Cities with market-based 'open' trash collection

• Burnsville

• Eden Prairie

• Plymouth

• Woodbury

• Fridley

Cities with organized, multiple haulers

• Bloomington

• Minneapolis

• Vadnais Heights

Cities with single haulers

• Blaine

• Maplewood

• White Bear Lake