Police Jury poised to approve solid waste contract

   It appears there will be no drastic change in the parish’s garbage collection-disposal system for at least the next few years -- assuming a proposed renewal of the current service contract is approved by the full Police Jury.

   The Avoyelles Police Jury’s contract with Progressive Waste Solutions has been negotiated and approved by the Solid Waste Committee. It was sent to District Attorney Charles Riddle for legal review after the jury’s Oct. 6 committee meetings.

   There was no discussion on the issue at the committee meeting because committee Chairman McKinley “Pop” Keller was absent and unable to give a report. It did come up briefly at the Oct. 13 jury meeting, but action was postponed pending legal review by Riddle.

   Jury President Charles Jones told jurors that issues in the contract extension have been hammered out. Once Riddle assures that all of the legalities are covered in the contract, it will be presented to the jury for final adoption.

   “I believe the parish gets everything it wanted in the contract,” Jones said. “The big thing is the company providing ‘satellite’ trucks and ensuring residents on bad roads are served.”

   Jurors have said the large side-loading garbage trucks are too big and too heavy for some roads in the parish. The previous contractor used smaller vehicles to go on these roads to collect garbage. The jury called these “satellite trucks.”

   The current contract with Progressive expires Dec. 31, so there is no pressure to act this month. Jones said after the committee meetings that it appeared there would be no objection to renewing the contract with Progressive.

   However, several jurors have said they want the Police Jury to change the way it handles the parishwide solid waste program in the near future.

  Based on previous discussions on the issue, the jury has indicated it might consider splitting the program into three contracts -- collection, hauling and disposal -- which jurors hope will entice competition and result in a lower cost to the parish. A bonus benefit would be if a local contractor could win the collection and/or hauling contracts.

  For this proposal to work efficiently, however, the jury would have to construct a waste transfer station, where the collection trucks would dump residential garbage into large trailers that would then be hauled to the landfill that is awarded the disposal contract.

   It would probably not be efficient for a collection contractor to drive the garbage truck directly to the landfill for disposal.

   Under the current contract, Progressive handles all aspects of the solid waste program -- from curbside collection to landfill disposal.