Jackson considering new fee for trash collection

JACKSON, Mo. -- In 1974, Jackson residents passed a 1-cent sales tax aimed at providing residential trash collection, developing the city parks system, making capital improvements for the fire and police departments and improving streets.

The campaign slogan was "A penny will do the job."

A penny doesn't do the job any more, city administrator Jim Roach says.

Utility bills the city sent to 3,900 Jackson residences this month included a survey that sounds out citizens' opinions about the city's trash collection and recycling programs. The survey reflects Roach's belief that the time has come for trash collection to pay for itself, especially if residents want Jackson to begin providing curbside recycling.

But a former Jackson mayor says residents don't have enough information to know whether there should be a change. Carlton "Cotton" Meyer, who served as mayor for 10 terms through the 1980s, suggested that eliminating pickup of yard waste might be one place for the city to cut back.

He said he would hate to see the city renege on its 1974 promise of free residential refuse collection, but added, "It's a promise. I don't guess it says forever. Is the city obligated because they once made that statement?"

Meyer thinks Jackson residents would back trash collection fees "as long as they justify the increase."

The results of the survey will be tabulated at the end of September.

Five of the nine questions focus on the need for a curbside recycling program. A multiple choice answer to the first survey question is the city's own proposal to charge each residential customer $10 per month for two 33-gallon bags and $1 for each additional bag. The city also proposes to charge customers $2 per month for unlimited curbside recycling.

The fees would generate about $600,000 annually.

Part of the problem with the city's current trash collection system is that a limit has never been imposed on the number of trash bags that can be put on the curb, Roach says. At some residences, trash collectors encounter 15 or 20 bags each week. Officials believe that relatives or friends who live outside the city limits routinely drop off their trash.

"The same people seem to generate more trash," Roach said. "The system is being abused."

Dramatic changes

Jackson has changed dramatically since the sales tax was passed in 1974, eliminating a $2-per-month trash collection fee. In 1975, the city's general fund revenues totaled $470,000, including $50,000 from sales taxes, with property taxes and surplus income generated by its electric utility making the major contributions. In 2001, the city's general fund revenues were $3.7 million, including $1.6 million from sales taxes.

Roach is concerned about the increasing amount of the city's electric surplus going into the general fund. In 2001, disbursements and transfers paid from the general fund exceeded receipts and transfers received by $226,000. The electric surplus contributed $950,000 to the fund compared to $73,000 in 1975.

Roach says the city may not always have the extra money available.

Other factors are involved in the push to impose fees. In 1975, the city owned a landfill. Since the landfill closed a few years ago, the city has had to pay tipping fees at a transfer station that amounted to $137,830 in fiscal 2001.

The city provides two annual "cleanup/fix-up" weeks, weekly yard waste collection and has added a recycling center to the services provided by the sanitation department.

The city's recycling center doesn't make enough money to cover its labor costs, Roach says. Curbside recycling could greatly reduce the amount of solid waste the city's sanitation department picks up and thus its tipping fees, he adds.

Skeptics point to the increase of the city's sales tax revenues from zero in 1974 to $1.6 million in 2001.

"I would agree that sales tax revenues have increased," Roach said, "but they haven't kept pace with the cost increases. And that's not because we haven't been frugal or haven't streamlined operations."

Budget increases

In 1975, the city's combined sanitation department spent about $94,000. In 2001, the sanitation budget was $560,000. That amount included the tipping fees from the city's landfill fund and $100,000 to buy a sanitation truck. The department employs seven workers.

"We have a half-million-dollar budget that is not fee-based, and it is growing at an astounding rate," Roach said.

But budgets for other city departments supported in part by the sales tax have increased even more. Those departments are not fee-based and for the most part can't be.

The largest increase in expenditures has been for the police department, which went from $121,000 in 1974 to $1.1 million in 2001.

Many cities have passed a health and safety sales tax to pay for police and fire protection. Jackson elected officials do not want to raise taxes.

Jackson's 1-cent sales tax is low compared to other cities in the region. Cape Girardeau has a 2-cent sales tax and a population three times Jackson's. Perryville, Mo., has a sales tax of 1.875 cents and a population of 7,800. Jackson's population is 12,000.

People in the community are talking about the fee proposals in the trash survey, says Grace Wille, a Jackson resident for 36 years. "I heard a lot of them that didn't want it," she said. "But Cape has it. I think we've been very fortunate that we've had this free pickup all this time."

Wille said she needs to hear more about the city's justification for fees.

She backs up city officials' contention that some people are taking advantage of the free trash collection system.

"When we have Cleanup/ Fix-up Week, I have noticed that people from the country will come in and bring appliances and put them at neighbors' yards. I don't think that's fair," she said. "I felt bad for the pickup boys. That was just more on their shoulders. It wasn't really the city's trash."

The current system also encourages people to throw away trash rather than recycle, Roach says.

"Other cities charge a fee and have a bag limit. If we have no incentive to recycle, we're not going to do it. People are trained to bag it up and throw it away."

Halfway there

Twenty percent of Jackson's trash is recycled, not a bad figure considering residents that participate must take it to the recycling center, Roach said. The state goal for cities is 40 percent. "We're halfway there with no effort," he said.

If no trash fee is instituted, Roach said he will recommend at least eliminating yard waste pickup, reducing Cleanup/Fix-up Week to once a year and strengthening the violation clause in the city's trash collection ordinance. Curbside recycling will not be possible, Roach said.

He does want the city to keep operating a sanitation department.

"I'm not advocating that we get out of the trash collection business and it be privatized," he said. "I don't want to do that. We give better service at a better price. We don't want to lose that."

Whatever changes are instituted will take effect Jan. 1.

sblackwell@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182