Agenda - Council - 06/25/1991 - Laserfiche WebLink

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program. A disadvantage of this alternative is that individuals without collection services would be eliminated from the recycling program. Communities in thc County without municipally provided collection have a number of residents without contract collection service. The percentage of such residents is highly variable depending on the source of the estimate. The efficiency of recycling programs in these communities retie, et this in decreased weight per household. Another disadvantage with this alternative would not be as efficient as utilizing a single vendor collecting for the entire City. For example three or four collectors would each have to travel down the same street to collect for their individual customers. The cost of this inefficiency is borne by residents in their collection costs. It should be anticipated that some vendors will either stop servicing Ramsey or raise their charges for services if this option is selected. Previously, staff had indicated that the City would need to amend its ordinance to require mandatory refuse collection in order to comply with SCORE requirements. This is not the case, however, pending state legislation is considering such a requirement. Alternative C - Contract with a single vendor to provide curbside recycling and bill the residents directly for the service. This alternative would operate like alternative A, except for the financing aspects. Residents would be billed by the City. A major disadvantage is the cost of the City billing. Salary, supplies and postage would be approximately $34,000 annually based upon quarterly billing. In addition $5,000 would be required for the start-up software. The billing cost would increase the cost of the program by 70%. Alternative D - Contract with a single vendor to provide curbside recycling and have the vendor bill the residents directly. · This alternative would operate like Alternative A and would free the City from financial involvement with the program. The greatest disadvantage is the increased costs to the residents due to the administrative costs. When bids were received last fall, this option was anticipated and alternative bids were received. Administrative costs which were solicited from four bidders for providing service to 3500 households were highty variable. Annual costs varied from $12,600, $25,200, $42,000, and $151,200. Unfortunately, the contractors with the lowest administrative billing costs submitted bids for the collection service itself which were 60% to 80% higher than the Iow bidder. Based upon the bidding conducted last September, either options C or D can be expected to increase the cost of the program by a minimum of 70%. This is an unacceptable high cost and neither of these alternatives are recommended because of this reason. This leaves Alternatives A and B. Alternative B provides the advantage of minimal City involvement at the expense of creating a tess effective recycling program. In addition, conlractors will need to pass on the cost of recycling to their customers. If Alternative A is selected, City Staff would recommend monitoring recycling bids in the area to determine whether the service should be re-bid in late August or whether the contract should be extended its full term of 27 months as originally bid. If alternative B is selected, Staff should be directed to prepare an ordinance change requiring all refuse collectors in Ramsey to provide curbside recycling as a portion of their service. Recommendation Council may be aware of future budget impacts of this past legislative session. Due to these impacts, staff has begun to explore other avenues of funding City activities. Recycling falls into a category of having several funding alternatives. Because of this, compounded by the fact that the current system appears to be working, we recommend extension of the current service level and I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I