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Raleigh council leans toward enhancing yard-waste collection; staff to return with costs and options
Summary
Transportation staff outlined challenges with the city's loose-leaf collection program and presented four options including no change, enhancement, privatization and transition to an enhanced yard-waste program; councilors generally favored exploring an enhanced yard-waste model and asked staff for detailed cost and implementation analysis.
Steve Halsey, assistant director for Transportation maintenance, told the City Council the loose-leaf collection program has not seen significant changes since 2011 and that growth in the city has lengthened collection schedules and created resident dissatisfaction.
Halsey said the program currently uses 61 total staff (48 of whom are flexed from other transportation duties) and 23 specialized pieces of equipment; the program runs November through March and averages roughly 64,383 cubic yards collected across the last two seasons. He said continuing the program as currently structured diverts transportation staff from sidewalk repair, pavement patching, street sweeping and stormwater maintenance.
Halsey presented four options: make no change; enhance the existing program (three enhancement options were in a 2022 budget note); privatize the service (a Henrico County, Va., model uses a call-in on-demand contractor); or transition loose-leaf collection into an enhanced, weekly yard-waste collection run by Solid Waste Services (Greensboro implemented such a transition in 2024). Halsey said an enhanced yard-waste program would require about 15 additional staff and five trucks to provide weekly collection to all residents and would need strong communication and enforcement during transition.
Council discussion ranged across cost, equity and operational trade-offs. Councilor Branch and others favored a hybrid pilot between multiple drop-off sites and contracted curbside to build data without immediately taking on full curbside responsibility. Several councilors said weekly city-run collection was preferable to doing nothing; Councilor Brauch said she favored Option 4 because Solid Waste already manages yard waste and could determine appropriate pickup frequency.
Councilors asked for specific follow-up: updated cost estimates (both startup and ongoing), an analysis of options for weekly versus biweekly service, feasibility of a paid on-demand bulky-load pickup, potential temporary offsets for biodegradable bags, and additional comparisons to other municipalities (Greensboro, Henrico). Halsey said recent total program cost including staff and fixed equipment is about $3.1 million, with roughly $2 million of that being fixed staff and equipment costs, and that older budget memos (2022) contain higher historical estimates that need updating.
No formal vote was held; councilors directed staff to return with detailed financials, staffing plans and an implementation timeline for any recommended transition.
