Mustang Daily Staff Report
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Students paying for their own garbage pickup will soon have fewer cents to spare, as the San Luis Obispo City Council voted this past week to increase pickup rates starting next month.
San Luis Garbage Co. requested the 3.4 percent increase because of higher fuel and tire costs as well as labor and health insurance costs. In addition, the company cited a loss in revenue because of customers downsizing from larger trash cans to smaller ones.
“It means that people are doing a better job at avoiding packaging,” San Luis Obispo Mayor Jan Marx said. “And the ban on single-use plastic and paper bags has probably contributed to less going to the landfill.”
Because it takes the same amount of work and gasoline to pick up the cheaper, smaller trash cans, the garbage company sought compensation in order to maintain its profit margin though, Marx said.
“To me, it sounds a bit bizarre,” graphic communication junior Aly Facha said. “In my major, we spend a lot of time talking about sustainable packaging, and if we’re just going to be paying more for less trash, then what’s the point of being sustainable?”
The increase in monthly costs ranges from 27 cents for households using 20-gallon mini-cans, to $1.31 for households using large, 96-gallon trashcans.
The council’s decision also means San Luis Garbage Co. will continue to dump green waste — biodegradable items such as food and garden waste — onto the Cold Canyon Landfill south of the city, in lieu of a compost recycling facility.
“It’s kind of a Band-Aid solution,” Marx said, “but the council has made it clear to the garbage company that we don’t want to see this go on indefinitely.”
The city closed its composting facility at the landfill in 2011 because of odor complaints from neighbors, and allowed the green waste to be kept at the landfill for one year while awaiting a better solution.
“Our understanding at the time was that the garbage company was to build an enclosed, green waste facility instead,” Marx said. “The optimum would be to have it composted on the site, so it could enrich the soil locally.”
Such plans have yet to become reality, and the garbage company was granted a second year of taking green waste to the landfill. The alternative would be driving to the closest composting facilities, located in Santa Maria and Templeton, but a city staff report advised against it.
“When we calculated the carbon footprint and the financial aspects of trucking the waste that far, we didn’t feel it would be worth it in the end,” Marx said.
However, a yet-to-be-passed state measure, as well as ongoing issues at the landfill, are threatening to shut the practice down within the next 18 months to two years, according to city conservation manager Ron Munds. The city is therefore looking for a local solution to recycle green waste, he said.
“This could be a business opportunity for someone to create something sustainable and really useful to the community,” Marx said.
Anna Hornell contributed to this staff report.