Kentucky City Set to Offer Multi-Year Collection Contract

Four firms expressed interest in privatizing the city of Henderson's garbage collection services, which will probably include curbside recycling.

Representatives of the four companies attended a pre-bid conference earlier this week (Oct. 16) at the Henderson Municipal Center, which was mandatory for everyone intending to bid on the contract. The four firms are BFI of Evansville, the Dozit Co. of Union County, River Metals Recycling of Henderson and Onyx Waste Services of Evansville.

Bids are scheduled to be opened Oct. 26, although City Manager Jeff Broughton said it will probably be a couple of weeks after that date before the city is ready to make a decision. "We want to start the program no later than July 1 of next year," he said.

The city is seeking a firm to do weekly garbage pick-up at the city's approximately 10,600 households. For about 39 weeks out of the year the firm would also pick up lawn clippings and other landscaping waste on a weekly basis. Furthermore, the city is seeking weekly curbside pick-up of recyclable materials, although the firms are also being asked to bid that service with collection every other week.

The city may or may not privatize all three of those "core services," Broughton said, depending on how the bids come in, but it will contract with only one company. The contract is for five years, although there is an option for a renewal of an additional five years.

Broughton also noted that the city is offering an incentive for the successful bidder to hire city sanitation workers who may lose their jobs because of privatization. For the first year of the contract, he said, the city will pay the firm $250 per worker per month for every former city sanitation worker hired by the firm.

The city has 10 sanitation workers, "but not all of those will be displaced," Broughton said. "We don't know how many there will be, but there will be some. The issue of who those are is not yet known."

Several of the potential bidders asked questions about the locations where garbage and recyclables will be picked up. There are about 10 dead-end alleys in the city, where garbage trucks are required to back in, and at least that many T-type alleys where large garbage trucks would have trouble turning the corner. Potential bidders wanted to know whether citizens living on those alleys might be required to take their garbage cans to the street instead of the alley.

"You ought to plan on wherever the location (currently) is," Broughton replied. "We're trying to minimize the disruption."

Curbside recycling, however, will not be done from alleys, Broughton said. The successful bidder will provide householders with 18-gallon containers, which will be collected at the street curb -- preferably on a weekly basis. All recyclables, such as newspapers, cans and glass, will be placed in a single container.

"You'll sort that curbside," Broughton told the company representatives. "There will be no sorting by the resident." The Gleaner