Redwood City to up trash rates

Beginning next year, about 85% of city residents will see their monthly garbage collection rates increase by between $3 and $5 depending on the size of the bin residents use.

Those with 20-gallon bins will see the largest increase, from $18.87 a month to $23.87, followed by 32-gallon users who will pay $38.86 a month rather than $34.86 and 64-gallon users with a $3 increase from $64.20 a month to $67.20. Residents with 96-gallon containers will see no rate increase, leaving their monthly charge at $95.31.

Some residents have taken issue with the changes, arguing that the increases are unfairly not applying to those with larger bins including commercial users.

But Public Works Director Terence Kyaw said the increases are necessary to ensure the cost of operations remained covered given that ratepayers fully fund the service and no General Fund dollars help subsidize trash collection.

For years, the city, like many jurisdictions throughout the state, has kept rates for smaller bins lower to encourage residents to throw away less in their black bins and to recycle and compost more. The most recent rate increase occurred this March when councilmembers agree to increase solid waste collection fees by $2 for 20-gallon bins, for a total of $18.87 per month, and $1 for 32-gallon bins, for a total of $32.86 per month.

Diversion efforts have largely worked with contributions to landfills greatly decreasing per household, Kyaw said. Despite less trash needing to be collected, Kyaw noted the cost of service from maintaining infrastructure to employing truck drivers and getting them on the road has only increased year by year.

Without rate increases, a study by HF&H Consultants indicated revenue would fall short of the cost of service by about $1.2 million. With the rate increases, the account would still fall short but by only $220,000.

Even with the increases, staff and councilmembers acknowledged the city’s rates are still below average when compared to those charged by the other 10 member agencies in the Joint Powers Authority, South Bayside Waste Management Authority, which provides oversight of solid waste management for its members.

Mayor Giselle Hale also noted the city is bound by state law, Proposition 218, which requires jurisdictions to set fees and charges for solid waste collection at rates proportional to the cost of providing the service to each parcel.

“There’s a very prescribed way in which these rates have to be compensated for, so we don’t have the ability to leverage other creative tools, other taxes, other forms of revenue,” Hale said. “We are pretty limited in what we can do.”

Councilmembers agreed to increase the rates, with some arguing that residents with larger bins have been subsidizing the service of those with smaller ones given that rates for larger bins have increased more steeply over the years.

Reddy suggested residents who do not often fill their bins completely offer to allow their neighbors, particularly those with big families, to take up the extra space. And Councilmember Alicia Aguirre said she hopes rate increases become less of a surprise to residents after years of little changes.

“Having been on the Utilities Committee for years, I understand the challenge and also the desire of the council to keep rate increases below double digits,” Aguirre said. “It’s very complicated and sometimes it doesn’t make sense so I hope as we move forward we can set the tone of what will come so that it’s not a surprise as it has been.”

In other business, the council also voted to expand eligibility for sitting on some city advisory bodies in a push to bring more diversity to city decision making. Key changes include removing a requirement that residents be electors — at least 18 years old and U.S. citizens — and instead setting the age requirement to 16 years old.

The change will apply to the city’s Parks and Recreation, Arts and Senior affairs commissions and Architectural Advisory, Housing and Human Concerns, Historic Resources Advisory, Police Advisory and Transportation Advisory committees.

The council also agreed to allow residents from unincorporated Redwood City to serve on the Arts Commission and the Parks, Recreation and Community Services Commission. Unincorporated Redwood City residents could already serve on the Architectural Advisory Committee, Historic Resources Advisory Committee, Police Advisory Committee, and Senior Affairs Commission and no more than two can serve on the Housing and Human Concerns Committee and the Transportation Advisory Committee without needing to satisfy professional or experiential requirements.

“I think they’re a great start but I don’t think this is the ending place,” Councilmember Jeff Gee said. “We’ll need to continue the dialogue about how we make sure we engage our communities and have a robust applicant pool for all of our BCCs going forward and that we have not only diversity but geographical diversity so all parts of our city are represented.”