No Bull, no Fluff, No Smudges
The Palm Coast government administration is recommending dropping trash hauler Waste Pro after 15 years and signing on to a $32 million, seven-year contract with Houston-based FCC Environmental. The Palm Coast City Council is scheduled to vote on the proposal Tuesday morning.
The charge for a single-family house would be $32.32 a month when the new contract kicks in almost a year from now: on June 1, 2023. It will be a 7.8 percent increase from the current rate of $29.97, but a 59 percent increase from the $20.36 fee Waste Pro had charged between 2017 and last May, when its contract expired. The $29.97 fee is intermediary.
The proposed contract with FCC calls for continuing twice-a-week garbage pick-up, once a week yard waste pick-up (maximum 2 cubic yards or 50 pounds, down from 4 cubic yards until last year), once a week bulk pick-up, and once a week recycling pick-up. Residents and businesses remain responsible for providing their own garbage cans (residents can put out up to five cans per pick-up). While the city is abandoning its previous requirement that at least some garbage trucks run on natural gas, the majority of FCC’s fleet is powered by compressed natural gas.
When the monthly garbage hauling charge increased in 2017 from $18.62 to $20.36, there was no inflation adjustment built in. Now there is: a potential annual inflation increase, capped at 4 percent per year.
The change is not a surprise. Palm Coast and Waste Pro have had a frayed relationship in the past several years, with numerous on-the-job failures by Waste pro and a threat last year by the city to sever the contract and opt for other options immediately. Waste Pro, which at one point went so far as to shift blame to workers for staying home (one of its workers was killed on the job and another severely injured in its last contract period), has been in repair mode for much of that time, regarding its Palm Coast contract. But the city’s patience appears to have run out for good. Beverly beach’s patience ran out in 2019, when it dropped Waste Pro and returned to contracting trash hauling from Flagler Beach.
Palm Coast should have had a new contract in place by now, whether with Waste Pro or with a new company. The city had, in fact, gone through the bid process last year, when only Waste Pro and FCC environmental placed bids. FCC won. Waste pro filed a bid protect, charging that the process was flawed. Palm Coast agreed and restarted the entire bid process, delaying a resolution for more than half a year. (See: “Palm Coast Was Set to Recommend New Garbage Hauler. Waste Pro Protested. City Will Re-Start Entire Bid Process.”)
Waste Pro’s contract expired on May 1. To tide the city over until it had a new contract in place, Waste pro and the city negotiated a one-year extension to Waste Pro’s existing contract, along with a 47 percent price increase Palm Coast Mayor David Alfin called “shocking and staggering.” (Alfin dissented in the 4-1 vote approving the extension.)
Rates increased on May 1 to $29.97, and Waste pro cut back service. The amount of yard waste residents were allowed to put at curb side (from 4 to 2 cubic yards per pick-up). The recycling rewards program, which had qualified residents for perks, was abandoned. The fines Waste pro would have to pay if it provided poor service were cut by half. When Waste Pro and FCC Environmental first submitted bids last year, Waste Pro was proposing a monthly charge of $32.23, a 58 percent increase from its price at the time, and FCC Environmental was quoting $33.43, or $1.20 more than Waste Pro, a 64 percent increase over rates at the time. Either way, Palm Coast residents were in for far higher rates. The one-year extension with Waste Pro has in effect cushioned the blow of the expected contract by enacting the lion share of the increase. Seen another way, it has masked the shock of the permanent, higher fees the council will consider and possibly approve on Tuesday. But those higher fees are not by any means particular to Palm Coast. They’re the new standard in the industry, as garbage haulers in the field, rarely well paid–especially in the South–are demanding better pay, fuel costs are exacting a price, and customers are demanding better service.
When Palm Coast put out the bid the second time, to fix its mistake, eight haulers attended the pre-bid meeting, three companies filed: FCC, Waste pro and GFL Solid Waste Southeast. Only Waste pro and FCC were invited to make a presentation to the selection committee, which consisted of five city employees. After the companies were ranked by the selection committee, Waste Pro and FCC were within two points of each other, with FCC ahead, but GFL was 25 points behind. A tipping point for FCC: its “proposed resources,” meaning staffing.
The contract calls for the use of “competent, qualified, sober personnel” personnel, with an appointed district manager who is to be the point of contact with the city, and field supervisors with at least five years’ experience managing a similar service. The city’s contract manager “reserves the right to disapprove and request removal of any Contractor personnel assigned to the City’s work,” according to the contract. The contract does not set out employees’ pay.
Other advantages the city cited in favor of FCC: More routes proposed resulting in fewer number of residences per route and a portal for viewing video from routes. The city may also be looking for a fresh start with a new company, after recurring customer service problems with Waste Pro over the years. Waste pro has contended that the problems were systemic–lack of drivers, hurricanes, Covid–not specific to its own brand. FCC did not have the lowest bid. Waste Pro’s bid of $32.33 came in lower than FCC’s $34.64, but FCC’s was negotiated down to $32.32, including a 20-cent administrative fee. This time, no one filed a bid protest when that deadline expired on June 3. The Palm Coast procurement office announced its decision to award the bid to FCC on May 31. But that decision needs city council ratification. While not impossible, it would be unusual for council members to override the city’s procurement process and either request a restart or opt for a bidder other than FCC, since the council members will not have been privy to the extensive process that led to the administration’s decision–and an override could carry the whiff of political favoritism.
It is not yet clear where FCC will operate from locally. Flagler County government for the past 16 years has piggy-backed on Palm Coast’s contract, to provide trash-hauling service to the unincorporated portion of the county. It is not yet clear whether the county will piggy-back on the FCC contract. But it is also not the first time that Waste Pro’s fate has seemed sealed in palm Coast, so news of its demise may yet be premature.
The Documentation on the Bids:
I don’t think twice a week waste pickup is necessary. Oftentimes, we don’t have enough to put on the curb on Sunday Night. And our recycle bin is fuller than the trash container. Seems that would be a great place to cut … less fuel used means helping the ozone a bit.
What is a “waste pro?” Is that someone licensed to toss trash wherever they feel? Is that a person who overspends professionally? Is it a four-flusher? Perhaps one who runs the water just for fun?
Can it be that a waste pro is just another term for “politician?”
This company has the contract for Orlando and residents there are NOT happy. WHY would you do this? This is a foreign company, in 35 countries. It seems that raise to the council may have been premature.
But it’s definitely time to pay for the volume of trash one produces. It’s patently unfair to have everyone pay the same price for vastly different amounts of trash that are being hauled. It’s unfathomable to me that for trash we, like communists, assume that everyone is equal while for, say, health care or energy or daily food everyone is made to pull his/her own weight.
The guys who come on Cameo Court are the best, why take a chance, Waste Pro has a 15-year record no one is perfect!
Looks like this is it, this will probably put my monthly water/garbage bill over my self-imposed limit. I’ll wait and see for sure, but yeah, this will probably do it.
Adios Palm Coast, I wish I could say I enjoyed the experience of existing here for the last 20 years, but I can’t.
Goodbye, and good luck to this f***ed-up, loonie bin.
The biggest waste in this town is the money they piss away on plants and trees. It’s just plant – die – and replace. The people in charge of the plantings must be graduates of trump-university !!!!!
I prefer to continue Waste Pro. Same trash higher cost? I like to keep my small bit of left over cash of $32 dollars for my milk, eggs and bread. I hope the council sees the comments on this matter here at Flaglerlive!
I say the City of Palm Coast pays the fee for all of us being that they think we’re all rich and it’s a drop in the bucket. Smh
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
Notify me of follow-up comments by email.
Notify me of new posts by email.