The growing storm of discontent and protests over the mandatory switch of garbage contractors in Indian River County spread from the residents of private homes to business owners last week as the new trash hauler started sending out bills to business customers representing cost increases of about 300 percent in some cases.
The owner of one business located along U.S. 1 showed copies of two invoices received, one in September for monthly trash removal totaling about $775, and another in the month of October for about $2,200, for the same service.
And, the business owner was warned, if the garbage truck driver had to get out of his truck during the trash pickup to open the gate to the storage location of the trash bins, there would be an additional $600 charge. That put the business owner in a real Catch-22 situation since the shopping plaza where her business is located requires gates to be closed to prevent people from dumping their trash in the bins.
“Sometimes at busy times of the year, which is not now, we ask for an extra trash pickup,” said the business owner, who asked not to be identified because she is still negotiating with the contractor about the new terms of service. “But we hadn’t asked for an extra pickup this time.”
When she finally got through to someone to talk about the invoice, which took a long time, the business owner said the lady she spoke to on the telephone was very nice but explained that the higher invoice was not due to any requested extra pickup, but was simply due to what she called a “normal” price increase.
For its unincorporated areas, Indian River County as of Oct. 1 switched from Republic Services to Waste Management (WM) for trash pickup with no opt-outs. The Town of Indian River Shores joined the county, but all addresses within the municipal limits of the cities of Vero Beach, Sebastian and Fellsmere and the Town of Orchid are not affected and are sticking with their present arrangements.
The business owner said that in view of the threat of an extra fee, she had planned to leave the gate to garbage bins open, despite the local regulations, to avoid the additional $600 for the driver, but the WM representative finally waived the extra fee for now.
“This is hitting everyone,” the business owner said. “I know a lot of people are also upset about it, but, like me, they don’t want to speak out and antagonize anyone for now because they’re still hoping to negotiate something.
“This was not fair, to wallop us with these huge new bills with no notice,” the owner added. “And it wasn’t fair, either, not to let us choose – just to impose it on us with no choice. This is really a monopoly so they can charge whatever they want.” She said she’s not sure who she’s more mad at – the Waste Management company that raised its prices exorbitantly, or the county government which imposed this raw deal on everyone.
A quick informal survey of businesses in the area revealed that many stores and restaurants had not yet noticed the huge price increases, in many cases because trash hauling invoices are handled by separate accounting offices or at corporate offices located far away.
“But I predict that when they realize what’s happening, this will have become a huge stink by next week,” the business owner said.
Earlier, the management of the switch from Republic to WM had triggered loud complaints from residents of single-family homes in the area about still being billed by the old contractor, Republic Services, for services no longer performed. In some cases, residents were even threatened with late charges and negative reports to credit bureaus for non-payments or late payments for the mistaken invoices.
Residents also complained that no one was picking up the old blue 95-gallon trash bins from Republic that were now obsolete since WM had distributed its own bins, gray for solid household waste and brown for yard waste. The old bins were left at curbside for pickup, for weeks in many cases.
In an effort to calm down the wave of protests over the way the switch of garbage contractors was handled, the Town of Indian River Shores last week sent out a message to its email list under the logo of the Waste Management company acknowledging that “the town is aware of transition issues and we continue to work with residents and WM to resolve any items as soon as possible.”
In the message, the town reminded all residents that under the new arrangement, all household trash and yard waste is picked up now only once a week, on Mondays (down from twice-weekly pickup under the previous contract), and that businesses and multi-family dwellings will have their trash picked up on Tuesdays. Supposedly, single-family residences will see a price savings from about $44 a month to just over $14 a month, which will be added as a one-time annual payment to the property tax bills from the town.
That message, however, seemed to have done little to calm down some residents. Some old garbage cans had been picked up in the meantime, but not all.
“I’m sick of looking at that big blue can on the curb at the edge of my property,” one resident said. “If it has to stay there any longer, I’m going to start charging somebody rent for it.”
Photos by Joshua Kodis
