Protest votes to block proposed Fresno trash rate hikes fall short for residents
Almost 35,000 Fresno homeowners or renters filed protest cards against a proposed five-year series of annual increases in the city’s trash bills for single-family homes.
But that wasn’t enough to block the Fresno City Council from voting on the plan at its June 27 meeting. The program, if approved, would incrementally raise the rates paid by residents for solid-waste collection services starting July 1 and continuing through June 2029.
Over the five-year period, the monthly bill for the standard trash service – once-weekly collection of 96-gallon carts for trash, for recycling and for green waste, such as leaves and lawn clippings – would increase from the current rate of $25.37 to $45.24, or about 78.3%.
The last time the city increased the rates for trash collection was in 2009, said Brock Buche, the city’s director of public utilities. Since that time, the operating costs for labor, vehicles and fuel in the solid waste division have increased substantially, and the division’s expenses have outstripped the revenue from rates each year since 2018. By the end of this month, the division will have depleted all of it reserves and be in the hole by about $500,000, Buche told the City Council during a public hearing Thursday.
Earlier this year, the city sent notices with protest cards to owners or renters of each single-family house in Fresno outlining the proposed rate increases. Thursday was the deadline for residents to file those protest cards if they opposed the increase.
Under Proposition 218, a state law requiring local governments to get residents’ approval for such rate increases, a total of 58,480 valid written protest cards – representing a majority of the affected homes – were needed to block further consideration.
By Thursday evening, the city had received more than 55,000 protest cards, of which 50,315 were deemed valid. But, City Clerk Todd Stermer reported, “of those protests that were valid, 34,803 were attributed to unique (property parcels), meaning these were not duplicate protests and only one protest per parcel was counted.”
Even including another 47 cards received during Thursday’s hearing, the number of protest cards fell short.
“Given that we have not received a majority protest on the proposed changes to the solid waste service charge, the ordinance to adopt the five-year rate plan for residential solid waste service charges is hereby introduced,” Council President Annalisa Perea announced following the hearing.
What are the proposed new rates?
The proposed rate increases, if approved by the council, would only apply to single-family homes within the Fresno city limits. Those residential customers are served by the city’s own trash-hauling workers in the Public Utilities Department.
Apartment complexes, as well as commercial, retail and industrial businesses, are served by private companies that have franchise agreements with the city and would not be affected by the residential rate increases.
Most of the city’s 119,000 households have what Buche referred to as “standard” service where each house has three 96-gallon carts that are collected each week: one for garbage; one for recyclables such as glass, cans, cardboard and certain plastics; and one for green waste.
Some houses, however, have an “alternative” service in which the gray container for trash is 64 gallons, along with the 96-gallon bins for recyclables and green waste.
The annual increases proposed for standard service are:
Current: $25.37 per month.
Starting July 1, 2024: $30.87 per month, an increase of $5.50.
July 1, 2025: $35.50 per month, an increase of $4.63.
July 1, 2026: $38.70 per month, an incresae of $3.20.
July 1, 2027: $41.99 per month, an increase of $3.29.
July 1, 2028: $45.24 per month, an increase of $3.25.
For the alternate service with the smaller trash cart, rate increases would be:
Current: $1920 per month.
July 1, 2024: $28.12 per month, an increase of $8.92.
July 1, 2025: $32.34 per month, an increase of $4.22.
July 1, 2026: $35.25, an increase of $2.91.
July 1, 2027: $38.25, an increase of $3.00.
July 1, 2028: $41.21, an increase of $2.96.
What happens if the rates aren’t raised?
The new rates, Buche said, will be a “true-up to cost of service” in the 2024-25 fiscal year.
The most significant costs for the solid-waste division are purchasing and maintaining its fleet of vehicles, including more than 80 trash-collecting trucks; fuel for the trucks; and labor.
Since 2009, when rates were last increased, “the (costs for) purchase of our refuse trucks have more than doubled” Buche said.
Tipping fees – the per-ton cost that the city pays to dispose of trash at a landfill or deliver green waste to a processing facility – are also up by about 13%, he said. Garbage workers collected about 164,000 tons of trash last year, along with 38,500 tons of recyclables and 82,000 tons of green waste.
Each of the three divisions within the Public Utilities Department – solid waste, water, and sewer – are intended to operate on a self-sustaining basis from the revenues paid by customers for the services.
After council members asked what would be the consequences if the new rates aren’t approved, Buche laid out two scenarios:
Offsetting cost overruns with contributions from the city’s General Fund, the pot of taxpayer money from which many of the city’s other day-to-day expenses and bills are paid.
Reducing the levels of service provided to households.
Neither option was palatable to council members.
District 2 Councilmember Mike Karbassi, who represents northwest Fresno, likened General Fund contributions for trash pickup to “robbing Peter to pay Paul,” to the detriment of other departments such as police and fire services that rely on the General Fund for much of their revenue.
“If we did reductions of service, what would that look like?” Karbassi asked Buche.
Buche said the first likely casualties would be free document-shredding days and free dumping days where residents can bring large trash items. Cutting those programs, he added, would not require any downsizing of workers.
“If that’s not enough, then we start looking at frequency of pickup,” Buche said. “The trash has to be picked up every week. That’s a requirement of law.” But the blue recycling carts and green bins for green waste could be pared back to every other week or perhaps even only once per month, he added.
“And if that’s not enough, then we get into potentially looking at what we’ll have to do with Operation Clean Up,” a once-a-year program across various neighborhoods of the city where residents can place large items at their curbside for collection, as well as other optional services.
Without the rate increase, “our shortfall will be $9.8 million in the first year; it’s pretty significant,” Buche said. “We’re going to have to start making very drastic cuts to make ends meet.”
He added that the solid waste division has not been able to buy new replacement vehicles for two years because there’s not enough money. “We have vehicles that are on the verge of complete failure,” Buche said. “We have to start replacing these to even maintain our current levels of service.”
Several council members said they understand the need for the rate increases, and bemoaned that prior incarnations of the City Council failed to take action on smaller rate increases in the past.
But concerns remain. “I’m still trying to get to a point where I feel confident in the process” of vetting the rate increase, said Perea, the council president. “There’s no doubt that we do need an increase in rates unless residents want to see a decrease in services.”
“I just want to make sure that this rate is rock solid,” she added, that it includes everything that it needs to include (and) that it didn’t overcompensate for anything.”
Help in dealing with the cost
The rate plan includes the creation of a new affordability credit – effectively a discount of $5 per month for low-income households that qualify, Buche said.
“Right now, the water division has this affordability credit program; it helps reduce the impact on the ratepayers,” he said. “We’re proposing the same thing here for solid waste.”
About 4,000 households are currently enrolled in the water division’s affordability credit, which requires recipients to qualify by being in Pacific Gas & Electric Company’s CARE program; eligibility for county service programs including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP, the federal Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children or WIC, or MediCal, the insurance program for low-income residents.
“This will really help offset that first year of rate impacts to those that are financially qualified for this program,” Buche said. “It’s really a great way for the department to help make it a little bit easier for those that are financially struggling.”
