TERRELL, Texas — The Terrell City Council opted Tuesday night to extend its 23-year-old waste services contract with Waste Connection for five more years in lieu of their historical two-year extension or seeking new bids — a competitive bid process which hasn't been conducted since the current contracts inception in 2000.
TERRELL, Texas — The Terrell City Council opted Tuesday night to extend its 23-year-old waste services contract with Waste Connection for five more years in lieu of their historical two-year extension or seeking new bids — a competitive bid process which hasn't been conducted since the current contracts inception in 2000.
The extension comes amid inForney.com's William Busby's reporting on complaints from area residents and commercial business in Terrell, some of which have had to stop work due to trash buildup and untimely pickups.
READ MORE: Terrell trash collection doesn't pass the smell test for area residents, businesses
Contract negotiations between the City of Terrell's Director of Public Service Glenn Caldwell and Waste Connections favored a five-year extension, over the historical two-year extension, due to a clause in the amendment which would allow any Consumer Price Index (CPI) rate increases to the contract to go before city council for approval — a move proponents of the contract say give city leaders "teeth" to hold Waste Connections "to the fire" over end-user complaints.
Starting off Tuesday night's discussion before city council, Caldwell says the current contract hasn't seen in an increase in rates since a CPI increase in 2018, despite what he says is the highest inflationary period in 40 years.
Currently, the City of Terrell is in a month-to-month rollover contract with Waste Connections which provides for a stable contract and waste services for an extended period of time while council considers their options, according to City Manager Mike Sims.
Those options, according to Caldwell's presentation, were a five-year extension with the proposed CPI clause, a two-year extension which proposed an automatic CPI increase in its second year, or an opportunity to open the contract for additional bids.
Caldwell told council members the proposed CPI clause, allowing for council approval, is unheard of in waste services contracts and that, if chosen, council members should expected the unexpected if they were to go out to bid.
Should they go out to bid, Cladwell told council members new rates would be high for both residential and commercial customers, though he did not provide any estimated rates or service comparisons.
Terrell Mayor Carmona echoed those concerns.
"If we go to RFP, then we don't know; the unknown," said Carmona. "If we look at what we've done in the past, I think the council has been cautious enough to know, that, better to work with what you've got and know that your in control of it rather than to leave it to the inflationary issues that is being put on everything now. I can almost guarantee that its going to go up. We got a good deal now."
Sims says he and city staff recommended the five-year extension. Waste Connections will still be obligated to present the annual CPI to the Terrell City Council who will then be asked to consider any proposed rate increases, which will be put to a vote.
Council newcomer Phil Robison questioned the length of the contract while acknowledging complaints from his constituents.
"I get a lot of inquiries and concerns from my constituents regarding the services; trash cans being torn up, and those kinds of things," he said, also mentioning smaller trash can size for residential users and the previous decision not to move to poly carts and mechanical trash collection vehicles. "But, that's not on the table currently."
Answering those concerns, Caldwell and the contractor told council members a move to poly cartons and mechanical collection vehicles would likely not be possible, due to significant investments costs, if a two-year extension was selected — again pointing to a five-year extension and possible rate increases if it was considered under a two-year extension.
"Committing to a five-year agreement, when I'm already getting a lot of concerns from constituents about that particular piece, it does give me a bit of pause," Robison said of the exclusivity for waste collection services in the city which has caused some commercial users to stop work due to untimely service and full dumpsters.
"With my due diligence, and our research with our team, we have not identified a service provider, at the levels that we require, that does not have a agreement in place for exclusivity," Caldwell responded. "So, it exists throughout the market, that's the norm. The City of Terrell for the longest, did not have exclusivity agreement in place and now we do, finally, we met the goal line, we hit a home run, because now we can benefit from not allowing other entities to come to our community and destroy our roads and drive away with no benefit to the citizens of this community."
Robison suggested postponing the vote to consider input from his constituents.
"Here's what I would say, with all do respect to the councilperson, we have worked this for some time, right, I understand you are new and have got some constituents, you've got some issues, but again, we need to get in discussion before we have a one-and-two with each other, but we will," Carmona responded, seeking a motion to begin discussion among council members.
Robison made a motion to postpone but did not receive a second. Council member Grady Simpson motioned for approval and was seconded by Mayor Pro-Tem Mayrani Velazquez. The table was open for additional discussion among the council members.
"Phil, I agree with ya and I understand where you're coming from and that is great that you want to consider your constituents in this matter," continued Carmona. "What we heard from staff was that its not uncommon for us to have this exclusivity and over the years we have talked about trash service and how it affects the city. I'm looking forward to when we get in discussion again, and we can bring this up once this is voted on, we can bring it up and then take up your concerns at that time with the poly carts and some of the other issues that you might have. So I don't want to ... discourage or say anything negative about who you're wanting to hear from but we have had those discussions in the past and I look forward to talking about those in the future."
Without much further discussion, the Terrell City Council approved the five-year extention, the 10th amendment to the original contract, in a 3-1 vote — Robison was the lone dissenting vote.