Barely six months into the transition, Georgetown Mayor Tom Prather says the city’s transition to privatizing garbage collection has been “disappointing.”
The private carrier, Republic Services has been slow to respond to complaints and concerns and initially and has not shown the initiative to correct ongoing issues, the mayor said.
“I am frustrated, not only with the response on day-to-day collections but also the administrative response from Republic,” Prather said. “Today, it has been over five weeks since we contacted Tim Ward (one of Republic’s higher administrators) and there has been no response whatsoever.
“We have requested data, so we can help determine what can be done to correct he problems. Some of the issues are failings by the company. We need this data to evaluate Republic’s performance. But no response.”
During almost every city council meeting council members have noted complaints from constituents regarding garbage collection. At first, Prather urged everyone to be patient during the transition, but as the complaints have continued, city officials are growing more and more frustrated. Frequently, citizens have taken to social media to complain with some declaring the city’s move to privatizing garbage collection as a “failure.”
Prather is not ready to call it a failure, but he admits Republic is going to have to improve soon.
“We’re not going to tolerate this on the behalf of the citizens,” Prather said. “We’re not ready for legal action today.”
Last year, the city elected to move to privatizing sanitation and garbage collection after the closure of the Central Kentucky Landfill and an analysis for the purchase of equipment and the ongoing need for truck drivers.
Republic was the low bid adding in recycling as a service, something most council members had advocated for some time. The city had offered to allow Republic to follow its trucks to learn the city routes, but Republic’s corporate policies would not allow such an action.
Some of Republic’s trucks are too large for some city streets and residents have been asked to bring their garbage a block or so over. The city has intervened at times as some residents are not physically able to maneuver the Herbies a block or so. Some residents have said they are often missed or trash gets strewn behind the trucks.
“This has been a difficult, difficult transition,” Prather said. “There are recurring problems that I believe are solvable with some communication.”
The city has continued to pick up brush and lawn debris.
