A pending rate increase for residential garbage collection has Columbus discussing looking for another service provider, while Lowndes County seems willing to take it on the chin.
Golden Triangle Waste Services notified officials with both entities this month it would be raising rates due to increased operations costs. The increase would take effect Sept. 1 in Columbus and Oct. 1 for Lowndes County.
Lowndes County Board of Supervisors accepted the rate change at its Thursday meeting. During a work session at City Hall, also held Thursday, aggrieved city council members mused about whether to end the contract.
The city entered a five-year contract with GTWS in 2023 for residential garbage pickup, agreeing to pay the service $13.95 per household month for once weekly pickup after years of paying less for twice weekly pickup. Under the terms, GTWS can raise rates each year, on the anniversary of the contract, if the costs to provide the service increase.
“So we negotiated to go down to once a week so our garbage pickup fees would not increase?” Ward 3 Councilman Rusty Greene asked at the work session. “We went down to once a week, and they still increased.”
“And still get horrible service,” Ward 4 Councilman Pierre Beard chimed in.
For the city, the rate would increase by 84 cents to $14.79 per month. The city adds a $7 upcharge to the bills of its roughly 9,600 households to cover disposal fees at the regional landfill and other costs for delivering the service, Chief Financial Officer Jim Brigham said.
Passing the GTWS increase to customers would raise their monthly bill to $21.79. Not passing it on would mean the city eats about $100,000 over the next year of the contract.
Beard and Greene both floated the idea of requesting proposals from other vendors, with Beard pushing to see what returning to twice weekly pickup would cost.
Mayor Keith Gaskin confirmed either party could exit the GTWS contract with 90 days notice.
But leaving GTWS could have consequences. For one, Brigham said GTWS would charge the city $500,000 for the garbage cans it provides customers if the contract is terminated this year.
“We would assume a new company would assume that debt,” Brigham said.
Still, Chief Operations Officer Jammie Garrett, who joined the meeting by phone, said GTWS would likely be the least expensive option, even with the increase.
Greene saw her point.
“I’m glad to pay $20 a month to have somebody come down to the end of my road and take my trash off. I still think that’s a deal,” he said. “… But you do keep inching this thing along. ‘Oh there’s another dollar here. And another dollar. And another.’ They can do this every year, I guess, until this contract runs out.”
Lowndes County
GTWS is increasing what it charges Lowndes County to $11.16 per household per month, a $1.09 hike.
Jay Fisher, Lowndes County Administrator, said county residents’ current fees already reflect any potential fee increases from Golden Triangle Waste Services.
“What we try to do in the county is not make changes every time Golden Triangle Waste makes a change,” Fisher said following Thursday’s Board of Supervisors meeting. “We want to be steady.”
In 2023, Lowndes supervisors voted to increase rates for county residents from $12 to $15 per household per month in response to GTWS’s last rate increase.
Fisher said this increase to county residents was made in anticipation of further fee increases from Golden Triangle Waste, as well as to cover additional fees the waste service charges to the county which includes billing, fee collection and waste disposal.
“I forecasted ahead and looked at what other counties were charging, and so we went all the way to $15 so that we don’t have to make a change anytime soon,” Fisher said. “… The idea is that you have enough in your account to cover all of your costs, and that’s why we don’t like to make changes frequently to the consumer. We want it to be pretty steady, and so we anticipate that fees are going to rise.”
‘Everything is going up’
Mary Ann Gilliland, general manager for GTWS, defended the rate increase. For example, GTWS has invested heavily in replacing its aging fleet over the last few years.
“Everything’s going up,” Gilliland said. “The cost of trucks has gone up drastically. The cost of parts is going up. The cost of tires is going up. The cost of fuel is going up. … We have to be able to pick up garbage, so we have to be able to afford to buy the trucks, be able to afford to buy the parts, be able to afford to buy the tires.”
Insurance is another big expense that’s going up, she said.
Further, GTWS is not a for-profit company. It is a cooperative of the entities it serves.
“We lose money monthly,” she said. “We are a nonprofit organization. We’re not here to make money. We’re here to do a service. We don’t make money doing what we do.”
All of the other municipalities and counties the cooperative serves will see a rate increase, Gilliland said, including Oktibbeha, Webster, Eupora, Columbus Air Force Base and Mathiston.
Reporter Emma McRae contributed to this report.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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